Roberts: ‘Yes, I did. He hadn’t got half-a-dozen rods away—it all took place in a flash—and I could easily run him down. He was considerably larger than I—’
Mrs. Roberts: ‘Oh!’
Roberts: ‘—and he looked young and very athletic; but these things didn’t seem to make any impression on me.’
Mrs. Roberts: ‘Oh, I wonder that you live to tell the tale, Edward!’
Roberts: ‘Well, I wonder a little at myself. I don’t set up for a great deal of—’
Mrs. Roberts: ‘But I always knew you had it! Go on. Oh, when I tell Willis of this! Had the robber any accomplices? Were there many of them?’
Roberts: ‘I only saw one. And I saw that my only chance was to take him at a disadvantage. I sprang upon him, and pulled him over on his back. I merely said, “I’ll trouble you for that watch of mine, if you please,” jerked open his coat, snatched the watch from his pocket—I broke the chain, I see—and then left him and ran again. He didn’t make the slightest resistance nor utter a word. Of course it wouldn’t do for him to make any noise about it, and I dare say he was glad to get off so easily.’ With affected nonchalance: ‘I’m pretty badly rumpled, I see. He fell against me, and a scuffle like that doesn’t improve one’s appearance.’
Mrs. Roberts, very solemnly: ‘Edward! I don’t know what to say! Of course it makes my blood run cold to realise what you have been through, and to think what might have happened; but I think you behaved splendidly. Why, I never heard of such perfect heroism! You needn’t tell me that he made no resistance. There was a deadly struggle—your necktie and everything about you shows it. And you needn’t think there was only one of them—’
Roberts, modestly: ‘I don’t believe there was more.’
Mrs. Roberts: ‘Nonsense! There are always two! I’ve read the accounts of those garottings. And to think you not only got out of their clutches alive, but got your property back—Willis’s watch! Oh, what will Willis say? But I know how proud of you he’ll be. Oh, I wish I could scream it from the house-tops. Why didn’t you call the police?’