Reaching into his right coat pocket to transfer the copper bottle to the opposite pocket, in order that his coat might not be pulled out of shape, as he grasped the neck, one of his fingers went right into the mouth! The seal of Solomon was gone! A less resolute and quick-witted person might have been alarmed, but reasoning that the seal must have been knocked off during the fight at Mr. Smitz’s and nothing had happened since, he boldly examined the bottle. He could see a white substance as he looked into it, and by the aid of a stick he fished out a wad of wool tightly stuffed in the neck. A metallic chinking followed the removal of the wadding and set his heart thumping rapidly. He looked up and down the street. No one in sight. He tilted the bottle up to the light of a street lamp and saw a yellow gleam. He shook it and into his hands flowed a stream of gold sequins! He could not sufficiently admire the ruse of Prince Houssein. Money on the first messenger there had been none.
In a center more given to numismatics, or had he been willing to wait and sell the coins gradually, Mr. Middleton might have secured more than he did for the gold pieces, all coined at Bagdad in the early caliphates and very valuable. But he disposed of them in a lump to a French gentleman on La Salle Street for fourteen hundred and twenty-five dollars.
Calling on the young lady of Englewood within the next few days, he made no reference to these events, though she asked him several times during the evening what he had been doing lately. He did, however, hint at having profited by a certain fortunate “deal,” as he called it, but not a word did he say concerning the mournful girl or anything remotely connected with her.
Hesitating to hurt the emir’s feelings by exposing the obtuseness of his ancestor Noureddin and the foolish superstition of his descendants ever since, Mr. Middleton said nothing of these transactions when once more he sat in the presence of the urbane and accomplished prince of the tribe of Al-Yam. Having handed him a bowl of delicately flavored sherbet, the emir began the narration of The Pleasant Adventures of Dr. McDill.
The Pleasant Adventures of Dr. McDill.
It was twelve o’clock on a blustery winter night and Dr. James McDill was where a married man of forty ought to be at such an hour in that season, sleeping soundly by the side of his beloved wife. But his wife was not sleeping. At the stroke of the hour, she had suddenly awoke from refreshing slumber and become aware of sounds as of persons moving softly about the room, and after a little, seeing against the windows faintly illuminated by a distant street light, two dark figures, she perceived her ears had not deceived her. Shaking her husband unavailingly for a considerable time, in her terror she finally cast discretion to the winds and shouted:
“Burglars, Jim, burglars!”
Hardly had these words ceased, when the electric lights were turned on and Dr. McDill sat up in bed to find himself staring into the muzzles of three revolvers, held by two masked men, who stood looking over the footboard. Bidding them move at their peril, the man with two revolvers remained to guard the doctor and his wife, while the other began to ransack the room. As he did so, he carried on an easy, if not eloquent, dissertation upon the rights of man and the iniquitous conditions which made it necessary for the poor and oppressed to obtain by force, if they obtained at all, any share in the privileges and riches of the wealthy. As he discoursed, at times carried away by his theme, he gave over his search and paused to enforce his points with earnest gestures. This caused the other robber some disquietude and he cursed his compatriot and the doctor and his wife with a use of epithets that will not bear repeating and which showed him to be none other than a low ruffian. At last all the treasure in the room being taken and the doctor being forced to accompany them and disclose the repository of other valuables, the robbers took their departure.
Some weeks after this, two persons suspected of being responsible for certain robberies were taken into custody and the doctor called into court to identify them if possible.
“I noticed,” said he, “that the shorter of the two masked men was prone to gesticulation and that he had a fashion of holding his arms close to his body, as if tied at the elbows, and with hands fully open, fingers apart, thumbs extended, and palms upward, waving his forearms——”