knows what we
should have done without you. Alice, the moment you left the room, some
of them ran to the sideboard for the silver, another one proposed to
set the house afire, and that vile creature with the red handkerchief
asked me for my ear-rings and my brooch. I was trying to be as long as
I could about getting them off, when these gentlemen came in. I tell
you they looked like angels, and I'll tell your wife so when I see her,
Mr. Temple; and as for Arthur----"

At this moment Bolty, having finished the last knot to his
satisfaction, rose and touched his prisoner with his foot. "Captain,"
he said, saluting Farnham, "vot I shall do mit dis schnide?"

"They have got the one I dropped from the window?"

"Jawohl! on de gravel-walk draussen!"

"Very well. Take them both to the stable behind my house for the
present, and make them fast together. Then come back here and stand
guard awhile with the men on the porch, till I relieve you."

"All right. Git up mid yourself," he said, touching his prostrate foe
not so gently, "and vorwaerts."

As they went out, Farnham turned to Mrs. Belding, and said, "I think
you will have no more trouble. The men I leave as a guard will be quite
sufficient, I have no doubt. I must hurry back and dismiss the friends
who have been serenading me."

She gazed at him, not quite comprehending, and then said, "Well, if you
must go, good-night, and thank you a thousand times. When I have my
wits about me I will thank you better."

Arthur answered laughingly as he shook hands. "Oh, that is of no
consequence. It was merely neighborly. You would have done as much for
me, I am sure." And the gentlemen took their leave.

When the ladies were alone, Mrs. Belding resumed her story of the great
transaction. "Why, it will be something to tell about as long as I
live," she said. "You had hardly got upstairs when I heard a noise of
fighting outside on the walk and the porch. Then Arthur and Mr. Temple
came through that window as if they were shot out of a cannon. The
thief who stood by me, the red handkerchief one, did not stop, but
burst through the hall into the kitchen and escaped the back way. Then
Mr. Temple took another one and positively threw him through the
window, while Arthur, with that policeman's club, knocked the one down
whom you saw the German tying up. It was all done in an instant, and I
just sat and screamed for my share of the work. Then Arthur came and
caught me by the shoulder