At first things took their usual course. Ed Mason and I were informed that we were a gang of cutthroats, burglars, highway robbers, pickpockets, counterfeiters, and other kinds of ruffians, and bade to sneak about the streets. We were warned not to run too fast when the police approached to arrest us, and told that it was "no fair" to make any determined resistance.
When Peter Bailey, Rob Currier, and the others dashed out of the stable, clad (in their own estimation) in blue coats and brass buttons, we were to submit to arrest _ad libitum_.
But after we had been dragged in and confined in cells a dozen or twenty times, it began to pall, even on the policemen.
It had long ago become sickeningly familiar to us.
To give the thing variety, new victims must be found. We were weary of the business and had ceased to feel any terror at the prospect of confinement. We never served terms longer than thirty seconds, for we had to be released immediately in order to be arrested once more. With only two criminals in the world, the policeman's lot became a tedious one. Both prisoners and police felt that unless something happened the stable could no longer a prison make, nor wooden stalls a cage.
Peter proposed to reform the whole thing. He boldly suggested that we go outside our own circles and arrest the Irish boys,--those who went in the winter to the parochial school. It would have to be done with all the majesty of the law, and that required a billy for each policeman.
These were duly made out of broomsticks. With great pains a hole was burned through the top of each with a red-hot poker. Then a cord was passed through the hole, so the billy might be dangled and swung.
We were now ready for the prisoners, and our first campaign was all that the heart could wish. We waylaid a group of boys, and, without much struggle, soon had a prisoner in each cell. After a little we let them go.
They hurried off, remarking that they would get even with us.
These wholesale arrests were continued for two or three days, and all went happily. It was not until a week afterward that the reckoning came. Then a crowd of the outraged prisoners found Ed Mason and me alone, fell upon us, and beat us full sore. Without the whole force of police our authority had waned, and once again it became apparent that humiliation was ever our fortune in feats of arms.