“Yes, and I know you, the whole common crew of ye. You’re brave as dogfish chasing po’gies until you spy a shark, and then you run and hide. What are ye doing here? Why ain’t ye off with the men that’s trying to run down the burglars? You’re afraid. There’s not one of ye’s got the courage of a squid.”
“If you weren’t so old,” said one of the wrathy listeners, “we’d be handing you a taste of your own high-sea methods before you could say half as much.”
“Never mind my age,” bellowed Quinn, squaring away. “Come try it, any one of ye or the whole crew together. You’ll find it a bit lively while it lasts, or my name is not Aaron Quinn. Hoist anchor, you blackguards. Up with your sails, and come at me with every stitch set. What’s the matter, you lubbers—what’s the matter? Why don’t you come on? Afraid, eh?—afraid of old Aaron Quinn! A bold lot you are! You can wag your tongues loud and talk bold, but not one of ye has as much gizzard as a chicken. Bah!”
With a derisive gesture, he disdainfully turned his back upon them and slowly moved off into the darkness, seeming deaf to their jeers and cat-calls.
A few minutes later Urian Eliot appeared, made his way through the throng that respectfully stepped aside from his path, and was admitted to the bank. The door had not long been closed behind the president when it opened again, for Stickney, the grocer, whose manner as he came out betrayed that he was leaving the place with great reluctance and much against his will.
“How is it, Stickney?” called one of the gathering. “Did the robbers get anything, or were they frightened away?”
“Huh!” grunted the grocer, standing on the steps. “I don’t know. They waited for Eliot before they opened the inner door of the vault, and when he came he proposed, as I didn’t happen to be a director or some high muckamuck connected with the bank, that I should leave. And I was one who risked his life to follow Timmick into that place, not knowing but we might have to face desperate burglars armed to the very teeth. That’s the way they treat a fellow citizen who is ready to shed his blood for them. But what can you expect of men who try to run a bank in these days without a night watchman of their own? That’s their idea of economy, perhaps, but it will be a mercy if it hasn’t proved expensive economy. They take our money in trust and then fail to give it proper protection. Timmick refused to touch the inner door until Eliot came. Perhaps it was unlocked. It wouldn’t surprise me to learn that the bank had been cleaned out of every dollar and every scrap of security it contained. I have an account here myself; seventy-nine dollars balance, too. If there has been a robbery, somebody will have to make good. They can afford it, men like Eliot and Hayden and the others; but I can’t afford to lose it.”
His resentment seemed contagious, and there were others who began murmuring about the bank officials. But, for the most part, those who talked loudest had small accounts with the institution or none at all.
“What have they done about catching the scoundrels?” asked Stickney. “They ought to have ’em by this time.”
He was told that armed squads were searching for the cracksmen, although there had been no reports of a capture.