etter see if
he's out in the front yard first. Come on."

Eight or ten people were congregated in front of the Fry house,
conversing in a hushed, excited manner. The Marshal and his companion
bore down upon them. As the former had remarked, they were "mostly"
women. There was but one man in the group. He turned out to be no other
than Vicious Lucius himself.

[Illustration: _Eight or ten people were congregated in front of the Fry
house_]

"What's this I hear about you, Lucius Fry?" demanded Anderson Crow.

"Don't you dare arrest Mr. Fry, Anderson Crow," cried one of the ladies.
"He ain't done anything but give her what she deserves, and----"

"Can I speak to you private, Mr. Crow?" interrupted Vicious Lucius in a
hurried manner. He was wearing an overcoat that came down to his heels,
and a derby hat that rested rather firmly upon his ears.

Anderson stared at him in horror.

"Good gosh, Lucius, have you--have you had your hands cut off?" he
gasped, looking hard at the flapping coat-sleeves.

"Course I ain't," said Mr. Fry, lifting his arms on high, allowing the
sleeves to slip down a half a foot or more and revealing his hands.
"This ain't my coat. It's Jim Banks'. A little too big fer me--and the
hat too, I reckon."

"I just couldn't let him catch his death o' cold," explained the buxom
Mrs. Banks.

"He just simply won't go back into the house," said Mrs. Ducker. "And I
don't blame him, either. He's afraid he might throw her out of a window
and--and break her neck, didn't you say, Lucius?"

"No, I didn't. I said I was afraid I'd break the winder," said Lucius,
glaring at Mrs. Ducker from beneath the rim of Mr. Banks' hat.

"Where is your wife?" demanded Anderson.

"In there," said Lucius, pointing a drooping coat-sleeve in the general
direction of his domicile. "Come on over here by the lamp-post, Mr.
Crow. I got something important I want to say to you."

"You ain't going to give yourself up without a fight, are you, Lucius?"
cried Mrs. Banks in considerable agitation.

"You leave me alone," snarled Lucius in a manner so malevolent that Mrs.
Banks cried out delightedly:

"Oh, ain't he just grand? Did you hear the way he spoke to me, Emma
Ducker? Goodness, what would I give if I had a man that could talk to me
like--"

"You ought to heard what he said to me when I asked him to come over to
our house and--" began Mrs. Ducker somewhat acrimoniously.

"Oh, cut it out--cut it out!" rasped Lucius. "B