“‘Yis,’ he says, ‘I guess ye caught me. It does sound a bit queer whin I come to think about it. But I’ll tell ye what I’ll do,’ says he, brightenin’ up sudden-like, ‘I’ll take it all back!’
“So help me, it was too much for anny man! Whativer he was, I give him up. And him settin’ there lookin’ at me like he was twelve years old! Me brains was in a prespiration from tryin’ to put a label on him, but no sooner was they findin’ a explanation of him than he goes to work and proves thim wrong entirely. They might as well been a omelette in me head. It was queer doin’s, but what it was behind thim no wan could be tellin’. ‘This is me last kidnappin’,’ says I to mesilf. ‘I want something easy on me nerves like burglin’, and I wish I was safe on the East Side with me little human conundrum, bad scran to him, and what is he smilin’ to himsilf about now?’ thinks I.
“‘Do ye want to know what I’m smilin’ about?’ says he right thin.
“‘Yis, sor,’ says I, feeble, ‘if ye don’t mind sayin’’—me heart nearly pantin’ itsilf to death. ‘Holy saints!’ thinks I, ‘is the little divil wan of thim mind-readers, or is he the divil himsilf?’
“‘Well,’ says he, pleasant, the car startin’ on thim bed-spring curves down to the ferry, ‘I’ve been thinkin’ that whin you and me has got through with each other,’ he says, lookin’ at me with thim fish-eyes in a way that raised the goose-flesh on me, ‘I’ll be tryin’ this kidnappin’ business mesilf. You like it pretty well, don’t ye?’
“‘They ain’t nothin’ like it,’ I says, thankin’ God it was the truth. And just thin the car stopped in front of the ferry.
“‘See here, me man,’ says he, as we was gittin’ off, ‘if me frinds can’t be raisin’ the eight thousand, we can be makin’ it five ag’in, and if they can’t be findin’ that much, would ye be willin’ to let me loose long enough to kidnap some wan ilse and pay ye?’
“‘Oh,’ thinks I, ‘so that’s what ye’ve been drivin’ at! But thin,’ says me second thoughts, ‘why has he been tellin’ me—’ We was walkin’ in the door of the ferry, and I grabs hold of his arm, fair burstin’ with rage, bein’ nervous from what I’d been through: ‘Ye scut,’ I says, ‘didn’t ye say your father was rollin’ in money?’
“‘Yis,’ says he, calm and pleasant, ‘but I 409 took all that back. I ain’t got anny father now. Ye’ll have to be payin’ for the ferry-tickets,’ he says.
“It was the ind of me last hope, and me knees wint weak under me. I’d been thinkin’ I’d found out wan thing about him annyways, and now I couldn’t even raymimber what it was, excipt that it was wrong. Whin I begun thinkin’ ag’in, we was on the ferry-boat, the two of us, and him so cheerful it brung the tears to me eyes and made me nervouser than I’d been yit. Thin me wits come to me assistance, and I seen what was the sinsible thing to be doin’ with the nasty little divil. ‘Rich or poor,’ I says to mesilf, ‘rich or poor, drunk or sober, intilligent or what he looks like, lunytic or no lunytic, divil, ghost, sleep-walker, or plain human, whativer he is or ain’t, or all of thim togither, I want no more of him!’