That scared Timothy, and he seized the figure and jerked it to the light of the moon that shone in through the door. “Be the saints!” he muttered in alarm, “it’s a sojer, an’ he’s all tied up.”
“Um—um—um!” groaned the figure in a “nasal” tone.
It was Chauncey whom the tramp had found; Chauncey had slipped into his plebe trousers before he ran to the tent door, which accounted for the man’s exclamation, a “sojer.” If he had found Mark or Texas he would have exclaimed still more, for the latter two were clad in their underclothing.
Mr. O’Flaherty was a man of quick action; he saw that he couldn’t gratify his curiosity about that strange traveler unless he cut him loose; so he did it.
Chauncey’s first act to celebrate his liberty was a stretch and a yawn; his second was to seize the knife and rush to the back of the car, with the result that two more persons appeared in the moonlight a few minutes later.
Of Mr. Timothy O’Flaherty they did not take the least bit of notice; they appeared to have something else of much more importance to talk about just then. And Timothy sat in the shadow and stared at them with open mouth.
“Well, this is a scrape,” muttered one of them, gazing at his own scantily clad figure and at the landscape rushing by.
“What kin we do?” cried a second. “The old Nick take them old yearlin’s!”
“Bah Jove!” cried the third. “This is deucedly embarrassing. I cawn’t go out on the street, don’t cher know, dressed in this outlandish fashion!”
“And we can’t get a train back,” cried the first.