Furthermore, he had his fingers around it and — well, it was very surprising indeed, but it seemed he must have put a little too much on the ball! The two of them were rolling down together, first one on top and then the other on top and this Duncan trying to sock him all the time and also using language you would never expect to hear from a decent person.
And still furthermore, there was another of them damned iron armor suits on the other side of the stairs and it seemed they were going to take this one head-on and — maybe two seconds, as he lay on his back, Johnny Dolan could see this large helmet leaning over nearer and nearer to him, exactly like the guy inside was saying: “What’s the big idea, punk?” and then it fell off and pasted him right between the eyes and—
It seemed there were many millions of stars, which presently faded out. It seemed there was a large bump, like a horn, on his forehead and he was scrambling to his feet and still looking at this guy in the cloth hat. And, no kidding whatsoever, he was that ashamed he could have gone down through the floor, but this party with the cloth hat which he had just choked was Mr. Van Inkle himself. He stood there now with his jaw stuck out, smiling very peculiar indeed.
“So you’re the burglar, are you?” he said, and even if his voice was quiet you could tell he was slightly mad. “I was just going to look around for you outside.”
“Well, lissen, Mr. Van Inkle,” Johnny Dolan said, “I am certain’y very sorry I give you the neck by mistake, but if you will kindly sneak back to bed, it can easy be everything is still under control an’—”
He cut it short; they were no longer talking private. Some party with little side-whiskers was hurrying downstairs in his bathrobe.
“You... you’ve got one of ’em, sir? God save us and keep us, you’re not injured, sir?” this one panted. “Mr. Van Inkle, there’s two of ’em, sir. I just found the h’other ’iding in the ’all closet above, sir — under a trunk full of books, of h’all places, and pretending ’e’s h’asleep, sir, and—”
“Go telephone for the troopers, Potter,” Mr. Van Ingle said, and continued to smile this same peculiar way at Johnny Dolan. “So you’re the... well, what the devil’s all the row above?”
How it sounded, there was a slight wrestling match in the upstairs hall and then some dame with a voice like a crow screamed:
“Cochon! Take ze hands from me, I tell you! Yes, I go to ze old man wiz you. He throw me from the house, I laugh — ha! ha! You hear me? I laugh — ha! ha! ha! Because for loaf one shall lose not ze job, not even ze life. For loaf, one shall lose ze whole world — and laugh — ha! ha! ha! ha!”
You could now see her coming down the stairs with this pretty young Mr. Gannon which Johnny Dolan had first choked by mistake. He was wearing his spectacles again and it seemed he was all hot and bothered. This dame with him was positively something you would have to go to the drugstore and get something for your eyes, after looking at her! What Johnny Dolan meant, she had a squint and a large nose and feet the size of rowboats. She was quite small, and the silk robe she had wrapped around her was much too big for her.
“I... I’ve got to the bottom of it, sir! To the bottom of it!” this Gannon puffed. “Here’s Annette.”
“Hey, lissen,” Johnny Dolan said, and he really had to laugh, “that out o’ the funnies looks as much like Annette as a cow looks like—”
“You see, sir,” the secretary was rushing on, “I finally got into Duncan’s room, when there was no answer to my repeated knocking. His bed has not been slept in, his two suitcases are missing and — so is he, sir! He slid from his window on a rope and the rope is still hanging there.”
“What?” Mr. Van Inkle cried, and started to turn white. He was furious!
“Precisely, sir! And then I took the liberty of... er... going to Miss Van Inkle’s room. The door was not locked and I made so bold as to tiptoe in and look, because she seemed to be in bed and asleep. She was not, sir!” Mr. Gannon cried dramatically. “Annette, here, was in her bed! The scheme, no doubt was to give the impression that Miss Van Ingle herself was there.”
“Oui, m’sieu, and it was vairee good scheme indeed, I zink,” this funny-looking dame laughed very defiant. And suddenly, Johnny Dolan began to feel very queer in the dome, on account of you would think these guys certainly must know this headache was not Annette, and at the same time they kept acting like she was. “For loaf, m’sieu, one does strange zings, ees it not? So tonight I steal to Mamzelle’s room and we change ze clothes, do you see? And she steal down to my room, m’sieu, and she ees not discover I zink, for now it would seem zey are a long time gone. Loaf, m’sieu — loaf, I say! — ees make again ze triomphe, even over you who have ze great power, ze great money, ze—”
The corridor, Johnny Dolan noted dizzily, had now started jumping up and down in front of him, on account of it seemed this Paul was not any Paul, but the Duncan number, and this pipperino which said she was Annette was not Annette and would consequently not be seeing him at eight tomorrow night. Only you would say the old palooka would open his chest and pin back the ears of this moll who, the way it began to look, had helped his daughter fly the coop. Instead, he just kept looking through two little slits at Johnny Dolan and getting whiter and whiter, and the way his teeth started to grind, you would say somebody was filing off a padlock.
“Potter — turn that other one over to the troopers,” he gritted out. “I want to — want to talk to this young man in private. Come!” he said to Johnny Dolan.
He took Johnny Dolan’s arm and led him off to the rear, and you would really be surprised how a guy that old could have such fingers, which passed through the muscles and simply grabbed the bone. He led Johnny Dolan down another corridor and into a large room, all books and big chairs. He locked the door and dropped the key in his pocket. Next he opened a window and, standing before it, took several deep breaths. Then he slipped out of his overcoat and you saw all he had on underneath was pants and a low cut undershirt. He had the same kind of arms you see on a piano mover and a very large chest, like a beer keg.
“I could send you up, but this will do me more good!” he said, in a funny whisper.
“Now, lissen, Mr. Van Inkle,” Johnny Dolan began soothingly, because things here did not look so hot, “if you are slightly sore on account of—”
He had to leave it lay at that. What he meant, this flat iron, or whatever it was Mr. Van Inkle had hidden in his hand, had just hit Johnny Dolan’s nose, and there were a billion stars and he could feel his nose going out through the back of his head. And he had somehow hit the wall and then bounced forward again, and in bouncing forward his right eye had met up with this same flat iron and there was another billion stars, and in maybe a split second his left eye also hit the same flat iron and there were still another billion! And it seemed the old palooka also had a sledgehammer which now came up and hit Johnny Dolan’s chin, knocking his head completely off his shoulders and sending him spinning across the room and — it seemed he was whirling at this open window and could not stop. It seemed that he had now fallen out and in some way he was running along the grass on all fours like a dog, on account of Sniffy O’Toole’s car was somewheres over this way. It seemed that behind him Mr. Van Inkle was screaming:
“Why the hell didn’t I close that window, the—” and after that he used words which you would never have thought a person like him would know.