"My real job," I said, "is writing. I'm a writer."
"Sure you are!" he chuckled delightedly. "You'n me both! I wrote this spiel here! I'm Henry W. Dickens!"
I couldn't seem to convince him of anything but that I was "some little kidder." He undertook to tell the world about that. To-morrow, in the garish light of day, when he dumps his neat parcels on my spotless table, I must really explain that——
The Next Afternoon.
Dear E.E. and M.D.,
I'm perished for sleep, but I'll write what I can. Just as I got to "that" above, my nymph called me. She was ill,—terribly, terrifyingly ill, and even I saw that there wasn't an instant to lose. And not a soul to send to the telephone.
I couldn't leave her—but I had to leave her! It didn't enter my head to be afraid—only of not getting the doctor in time. Denny's warnings were forgotten. I had done one block of the five when a man stepped out of a dark hallway, and halted in front of me.
Even then, until he spoke, I wasn't really frightened. But when he did,—I tell you, Emma Ellis and Michael Daragh, all the horror and wickedness, all the filth and sin of the world seemed to be closing in on me, stifling me, blinding me, hobbling my feet. All the windows about me were blank and black; a block and a half ahead of me was a blaze of light—Boldini's Saloon—"a rotten bad one," Denny had said.
I ran, oh, how I ran, but he ran, too, faster, faster. I tried to reach out for something to cling to—for a shield—Just fragments came—"angels charge over thee ... snare of the fowler ... terror by night...."
We were almost at Boldini's Saloon, and I couldn't run any faster, and twice he had caught hold of my arm.... Suddenly another fragment came—"in all thy ways ..." All! I ran through the swinging doors into the saloon, out of the horrid, dark night into the horrid light, and I stumbled and went down onto my knees and pulled myself up by the bar, and I heard my voice—"Men—men—Please—I was going to the drug store to telephone—a woman is sick—a baby—she's all alone there—and this man—this man—" I hung onto the edge of the bar and everything spun dizzily round with me, but I saw three men bolt through the door and fall upon him.