," he growled.

The bully had merged himself in the ring of onlookers, and Dolly, with a
cry of fury, flung herself in his direction.

"Stop that, will you?" the policeman said savagely, seizing her by the
arm.

"Go on, it's a dirty shame," cried Daisy. "Why don't you take the fellow
as knocked her down?"

Michael by this time had forced his way through the crowd, rage beating
upon his brain like a great scarlet hammer.

"You infernal ass," he shouted to the constable. "Haven't you got the
sense to see that this woman was attacked first? Where is the blackguard
who did it?" he demanded of the stupid, the gross, the vilely curious
press of onlookers. No one came forward to support him, and Hungarian
Dave had slipped away.

"Move on, will you?" the policeman repeated.

"Damn you," cried Michael. "Will you let go of that woman's arm?"

The constable with a bovine density of purpose proceeded apparently to
arrest the wretched Dolly, and Michael maddened by his idiocy felt that
the only thing to do was to hit him as hard as he could. This he did.
The constable immediately blew his whistle. Other masses of inane bulk
loomed up, and Michael was barely able to control himself sufficiently
not to resist all the way to Vine Street, as two of them marched him
along, and four more followed with Daisy and Dolly. A spumy trail of
nocturnal loiterers clung to their wake.

Next morning Michael appeared before the magistrate. He listened to the
charge against him and nearly laughed aloud in court, because the whole
business so much resembled the trial in Alice in Wonderland. It was not
that the magistrate was quite so illogical as the King of Hearts; but he
was so obviously biassed in favor of the veracity of a London
policeman, that the inconsequence of the nightmare which had begun last
night was unalterably preserved. Michael, aware of the circumstances
which had led up to what was being made to appear as wantonly riotous
behavior in Leicester Square, could not fail to be exasperated by the
inability of the magistrate to understand his own straightforward story.
He began to sympathize with the lawless population. The law could only
seem to them an unintelligent machine for crushing their freedom. If the
conduct of this case were a specimen of administration, it was obvious
that arrest must be synonymous with condemnation. The magistrate in the
first place seemed dreadfully overcome by the sorrow of beholding a
young man in