She was down now, but not defeated. Still she fought from the ground, but their united weight was too much for her. She fell exhausted. Then with main strength they hauled, pushed, lifted her into the taxi, and piling in after her, panting and bleeding from a score of wounds, they sat on her as fearfully as one might sit on an exhausted wild cat. The taxi glided away, and I saw them no more.
As to the sequel, I found it all in the columns of the Matin two mornings after. Herewith is a general translation:
“Madame Séraphine Guinoval is a buxom brunette who carries on a flourishing business in Les Halles. To look at her no one would suspect her of inspiring an ardent and reckless passion; yet early yesterday morning Madame Guinoval was the victim of an abduction such as might have occurred in the pages of romance.
“It was while she was going to her work in the very early morning that the too fascinating fair one was set upon by three young apaches and conveyed to a well-known temple of Venus. Madame Guinoval appears to have given a good account of herself, judging from the condition of her assailants as they confronted the magistrate this morning. All three suffer from bites, one received as he sat on the lady’s head; their faces are scratched as by a vigorous young cougar; two have eyes in mourning, while each claims to have received severe bodily injuries. A more sorry trio of kidnappers never was seen.
“But their plight is nothing to that of the instigator of the plot—a certain Irish American, known as the Colonel Offlazaire, a well-known boulevardier. He, it seems, became so infatuated with the charms of the fair Marchande d’escargots that with the impetuous gallantry of his race he was determined to possess her at all costs. Alas! luckless, lovelorn swain! He is now being patched up in the hospital.
“The real trouble began, it seems, when they got the Guinoval safely within that pension for young ladies kept by Madame Lebrun on the rue Montmartre. They put her in a dark room and turned the key in the door. Then to her entered the Chevalier Offlazaire, locked the door, and turned on the light. He then must have entered into a violent argument with the fair one, for presently were heard sounds of commotion from behind the closed door, a man’s voice pleading for mercy, and the smashing of furniture. So fierce, indeed, did the turmoil become, that presently the proprietress of the establishment, supported by a bodyguard of her fair pensionnaires, felt constrained to open the door with her private key.
“Not a moment too soon! For the unfortunate Chevalier Colonel was already hors de combat, while over him, the personification of outraged virtue, poised the amazonian Séraphine, whirling a chair around her head in a berserker rage. Terrified, Madame Lebrun and her protégées fled screaming; then the infuriated lady of the Halles proceeded to reduce the establishment to ruins. Very little that was breakable escaped that flail-like chair swung by outraged virtue. Particularly did she devote her attention to the room known as the Crystal Palace, where she smashed all the mirrors that compose the walls, and then ended by reducing to ruins the magnificent candelabra. Her frenzy of destruction was only interrupted by the arrival of the police.
“In consequence of the serio-comic character of the affair, and its disastrous effects on those who promoted it, the magistrate was inclined to be lenient. A nominal fine of fifty francs was imposed on each of the three accomplices, while the illustrious O’Flather was fined two hundred francs, and found himself so ridiculously notorious that he departed for pastures new.”
(As for Madame Guinoval, I think she enjoyed the whole thing immensely.)