one actually caught. However, the lunch never
came off. There was a queer old fellow standing on the steps of the
court who got me by the arm as I came out. Said he wanted to speak to me
on important business, and would I lunch with him. I didn't know what he
could possibly have to say to me, for I had never seen him before; but
he looked--it's rather hard to describe how he looked. He wasn't exactly
what you'd call a gentleman, in the way of clothes, I mean; but he
struck me as being a sportsman."

"Horsey?"

"Not the least. More like one's idea of some kind of modern pirate,
though not exactly. He talked like an American. I went with him, of
course."

"Of course," I said, "anyone with an adventurous spirit would prefer
lunching with an unknown American buccaneer to sharing a commonplace
feast with a mob of boys. Did you happen to hear his name?"

"He said it was Hazlewood, but----"

"But it may not have been?"

"One of the other fellows called him Cassidy later on."

"Oh," I said, "there were other fellows?"

"There were afterwards," said Sam, "not at first. He and I lunched
alone. He did me well. A bottle of champagne for the two of us and
offered me a second bottle. I refused that."

"He came to business after the champagne, I suppose?"

"He more or less talked business the whole time, though at first I
didn't know quite what he was at. He gassed a lot about my having
knocked down those two policemen. You remember that I knocked down two,
don't you? I would have got a third only that they collared me from
behind. Well, Hazlewood, or Cassidy, or whatever his name was, had seen
the scrap, and seemed to think no end of a lot of me for the fight I put
up."

"The magistrate took a serious view of it, too," I said.

"There wasn't much in it," said Sam modestly. "As I told Hazlewood, any
fool can knock down a policeman. They're so darned fat. He asked me if I
liked fighting policemen. I said I did."

"Of course."

Sam caught some note of sarcasm in my voice. He felt it necessary to
modify his statement.

"Well, not policemen in particular. I haven't a special down on
policemen. I like a scrap with anyone. Then he said--Harlewood, that
is--that he admired the way I drove that car down Grafton Street. He
said he liked a man who wasn't afraid to take risks; which was rot.
There wasn't any real risk."

"The police swore that you went at thirty miles an hour," I said. "And
that street is simply crowded in