"Come now," said the policeman. "Yes, or no! Will you be off, and go home?... Eh!... Or shall I take you to the station?..."
"You take me?... You take me?... Why, it would take four of you to take me!..."
There was no shilly-shallying after this! Wounded in his vanity, the servant of the law did not hesitate.
"All right!" said he; and seizing the plumber by the collar, although there was no attempt at resistance, he dragged his prisoner towards the town hall of the district, for the police station was there also.
"Some more game for the Dépôt!" said the policeman as he passed the guard.... "A fellow I can't get rid of! Are the cells full up?"
Other policemen came up. An arrest in a peaceful district gives interest to the dull routine of the men on duty.
"The cells full? Go along with you! There's only a small shopkeeper who had no papers."
Thereupon the unfortunate singer, who continued to stagger about, was quickly pushed into the dark room called "the detention room."
An ordinary every day incident of the streets, this arrest of a drunkard!
"I shall have to write out a report for this fellow!" said the policeman, who had arrested the songster... "and the 'Salad Basket'[10] passes in an hour's time! ... I shall just do it!"