the
devil!

On the other hand, unless his senses deceived him, there were police
officers in plenty only a fence or two away; and the back of this
house boasted a fire-escape. By inverting a convenient ash-can and
standing on it, an active man might possibly, if sufficiently
desperate, manage to jump a vertical yard (more or less), catch the
lowermost grating of the fire-escape, and draw himself up.

In a thought P. Sybarite turned the galvanised iron cylinder
bottom-up, clambered upon it, and on tiptoe sought to gauge the exact
distance of the requisite leap. But now the grating seemed to have
receded at least three feet from its position as first judged--to be
hopelessly removed from the grasp of his yearning fingers.

Yet that mad attempt must be made. Why die fighting when a broken neck
would serve as well?

Gathering his slight person together, P. Sybarite crouched, quivered,
jumped for glory and the Saints--and all but brained himself on that
impish and trickish grating. Clutching it and kicking footloose, he
was stunned by the wonder of many brilliant new-born constellations
swirling round his poor head to the thunderous music of the spheres,
as rendered by the ash-can which, displaced by the vigour of his
acrobatics, had toppled over and was rolling and clattering hideously
on the flagging.

In his terrified bosom P. Sybarite felt the heart of him turn to cold
and clammy stone.

No clamour more infernal could well have been improvised, given
similar circumstances and facilities as rude. It seemed hours, rather
than instants, that the damned thing wallowed and bellowed beneath
him, raising a din to disturb all Christendom. While, the moment it
was still, the cries of the police pack belled clear and near at hand:

"This way, b'ys!"

"There he is, the--"

"Got 'im now--"

"Halt or--!"

Another pistol shot!...

Glancing over shoulder, the hunted man caught a glimpse of uncouth
shapes wriggling along a fence ridge several rods away. No more than
the barest glimpse, it served: with a mighty heave and wriggle he
breasted the lower platform, shifted a hand to the top of its railing,
heaved himself up to a foothold, and swarmed up the iron ladder with
an agility an ape might have envied.

But as he mounted, it grew momentarily more evident that the stage
thunder manufactured by that wretched galvanised iron cylinder had, in
fact, served him far from ill; reverberating from wall to wall within
the hol