"What is it? What's so funny? Damn it! I miss ever'thing!"
"I-i-it's that f-fool Tum-Tump Pack. Bobbs's arrested him!"
The inquirer was astounded.
"How the hell can he arrest him when he hit town this minute?"
"Wh-why, Bobbs had an old warrant for crap-shoot—three years old— before the war. Just as Tump was a-coming down the street at the head of the coons, out steps Bobbs—" Here the little man was overcome.
The merchant from the corner opened his eyes.
"Arrested him on an old crap charge?"
The little man nodded. They gazed at each other. Then they exploded simultaneously.
Peter left his obese mother and hurried to the corner, Dawson Bobbs, the constable, had handcuffs on Tump's wrists, and stood with his prisoner amid a crowd of arguing negroes.
Bobbs was a big, fleshy, red-faced man, with chilly blue eyes and a little straight slit of a mouth in his wide face. He was laughing and chewing a sliver of toothpick.