But no sooner had this thought enhanced his irritation than he had its refutation in the discovery of the chauffeur affectionately embracing a lamp-post three or four doors away, toward Sixth Avenue; and so singular seemed this sight that P. Sybarite wondered if, by any chance, the fellow had found time to get drunk during so brief a wait.

At once, blind to all else, and goaded intolerably by his knowledge that the time was short if he were to forestall November at the asylum in Oscahana, he pelted hot-foot after the delinquent; came up with him in a trice; tapped him smartly on the shoulder.

“Here!” he cried indignantly—­“what the deuce’s the matter with you?”

The man showed him a face pale with excitement; recognised his employer; but made no offer to stir.

“Come!” P. Sybarite insisted irascibly.  “I’ve no time to waste.  Get a move on you, man!”

But as he spoke his accents were blotted out by a repetition of that portentous noise which had saluted him in the lobby of the Monastery, a moment since.

His eyes, veering inevitably toward the source of that uproar, found it quickly enough to see short, vicious jets of flame licking out against the gloom of an open garage doorway, nearly opposite the Hippodrome stage entrance—­something like a hundred feet down the street.

“What,” he cried, “in Hades—!”

“Gang fight,” his chauffeur informed him briefly:  “fly-cops cornered a bunch of ’em in November’s garage—­”

“Whose garage—?”

“Red November’s!  Guess you’ve heard of him,” the man pursued eagerly.  “That’s right—­he runs his own garage—­taxis for Dutch House souses, yunno—­”

“Wait!” P. Sybarite interrupted.  “Let me get this straight.”

Stimulated by this news, his wits comprehended the situation at a glance.

At the side of his chauffeur, he found himself in line with a number of that spontaneous class which at the first hint of sensation springs up from nowhere in the streets of Manhattan.  Early as was the hour, they were already quite fifty strong; and every minute brought re-enforcements straggling up from Fifth Avenue.

But the lamp-post—­still a mute, insensate recipient of the chauffeur’s amorous clasp—­marked a boundary beyond which curiosity failed to allure.

Similarly at Sixth Avenue, a rabble was collecting, blocking the roadway and backing up to the Elevated pillars and surface-car tracks—­but to a man balking at an invisible line drawn from corner to corner.

Midway, the dark open doorway to November’s garage yawned forbiddingly; and in all the space that separated these two gatherings of spectators, there were visible just three human figures:  a uniformed patrolman, and two plain-clothes men—­the former at a discreet distance, the two latter more boldly stationed and holding revolvers ready for instant employment.

“Fly-cops,” the chauffeur named the two in citizen’s clothing:  “I piped ’em stickin’ round while you was inside, an’ was wonderin’ what they was after, when all of a sudden I sees November duck up from the basement next door to the Monastery, and they tries to jump him.  That ain’t two minutes ago.  November dodges, pulls a gun, and fights ’em off until he can back into the garage—­”