"I wasn't going anywhere, specially," shouted the American. "Trying to find out what's the trouble."
The doctor shook his head.
"Diantre! This is terrible! Come with me; I am going to the palacio. Here! Let's get into this side street. This crush!" These exclamations were jogged out of him as he edged his body into this and that aperture. He made way for the drummer, who followed him body to body, and at last succeeded in pushing himself into the mouth of a stinking little side calle.
In this place the crowd dwindled to small groups and single pedestrians who hurried back and forth with ant-like aimlessness. Dr. Delgoa rested a moment. He wore a high hat; now he took it off, drew out a silk handkerchief, and mopped his face and hair. Somehow he had managed to preserve his silk hat; his black frock-coat and his pearl-gray trousers were unrumpled despite his struggle.
"We'll have to get away from here!" he said in a breath. "This calle will be untenable in thirty minutes.... The machine-guns...." He started walking along the calle, with the stragglers. "Caramba! I wish I knew which way the cat'll jump," he puffed, drying his hatband as he went. "One never knows what to do. I left my wife at home. Of course the telephones have been seized, and I can't talk to her. Where are you going, Señor Strawbridge?" He had evidently forgotten the drummer's answer to this same question a minute or two before.
"I'm trying to find out what caused this." The American looked back and listened to the inarticulate roar of the mob thundering in the tympanum of the narrow street.
Dr. Delgoa started to explain, but at that moment out of a back door of a shop bundled an old woman with a great pile of fiber hammocks. The men collided with her. The old creature spat invectives. She twisted about, saw who had struck her, and became more furious.
"It's that thief Delgoa! That bloodsucker Delgoa! May a ray of God blast your entrails! You stole every centavo my shop could earn, you and your cursed police! May you be bayoneted through the liver!"
Her anathemas were finally lost in the uproar. They struck coldly on the drummer's nerves in so perilous a situation, but Delgoa paid no attention to her. He began shaking his head, with his distressed look.