The little fussy rooster who called Dyckman dastardly said that he ought to be arrested. The reception he got for his proposal to bring a policeman into the club or take a member out of it into the jail and the newspapers was almost annihilating. The chairman of the house committee said:
“I trust that it is not necessary to say that this wretched and most unheard-of affair must be kept—unheard of. But I may say that I have here a list of the members present, and I shall make a list of the club servants present. If one word of this leaks out, each gentleman present will be brought before the council, and every servant will be discharged immediately—every servant without regard to guilt, innocence, or time of service.”
Dyckman would have liked to spend the night at the club, but its hospitable air had chilled. He sent for his big coat, turned up the collar, pulled his hat low, and crept into a taxicab. His father and mother were out, and he got to his room without explanations. His valet, Dallam, gasped at the sight of him, but Dyckman laughed:
“You ought to see the other fellow.”
Then he crept into the tub, thence into his bed, and slept till he was called to the telephone the next morning by Mrs. Cheever.
As he might have expected, Charity was as far as possible from gratitude. The only good news she gave him was that Cheever had been brought home half dead, terribly mauled, broken in pride, and weeping like a baby with his shame. Dyckman could not help swelling a little at that.
But when Charity told him that Cheever accused her of setting him on and swore that he would get even with them both, Dyckman realized that fists are poor poultices for bruises, and revenge the worst of all solutions. Finally, Charity denounced Jim and begged him once more to keep out of her sight and out of her life.
Dyckman was in the depths of the blues, and a note to the effect that he had been suspended from his club, to await action looking toward his expulsion, left him quite alone in the world.
In such a mood Kedzie Thropp called him up, with a cheery hail that rejoiced him like the first cheep of the first robin after a miserable winter. He said that he would call that evening, with the greatest possible delight. She said that she was very lonely for him, and they should have a blissful evening with just themselves together.
But it proved to be a rather crowded occasion in Kedzie's apartment. Her father and mother reached there before Dyckman did, to Kedzie's horror—and theirs.