“'What is it?' he sings out, kind of impatient.
“'There's just one thing we forgot to look at,' shouts Snow. 'Merely a matter of form, but just bring that—Hey! Stop him! Stop him!'
“For Parker, instead of comin' back, had turned and was leggin' it for the launch as fast as he could, and that was some.
“'Stop!' roars the Pinkerton man, jumpin' down the steps. 'Stop, or—'
“'Hold him, Jim!' screeched Parker, over his shoulder. One of the biggest men on the eleven—one of the three 'friends' who'd been so obligin' as to come down on purpose to play football—made a dive, caught the detective around the waist, and threw him flat.
“'Go on, Ed!' he shouts. 'I've got him, all right.'
“Ed—meanin' Parker—was goin' on, and goin' fast. All hands seemed to be frozen stiff, me and Jonadab and Peter T. included. As for me, I couldn't make head nor tail of the doin's; things was comin' too quick for MY understandin'.
“But there was one on that piazza who wa'n't froze. Fur from it! Willie, the poet waiter, made a jump, swung his long legs over the porch-rail, hit the ground, and took after that Parker man like a cat after a field mouse.
“Run! I never see such runnin'! He fairly flashed across that lawn and over the rise. Parker was almost to the landin'; two more jumps and he'd been aboard the launch. If he'd once got aboard, a turn of the switch and that electric craft would have had him out of danger in a shake. But them two jumps was two too many. Willie riz off the ground like a flyin' machine, turned his feet up and his head down, and lapped his arms around Parker's knees. Down the pair of 'em went 'Ker-wallop!' and the football flew out of Parker's arms.
“In an eyewink that poet was up, grabs the ball, and comes tearin' back toward us.