I replied that it was.  He seized me by the shoulder and began dragging me up the bank.

“What are you going to do?” I cried, shaking myself loose.

“We’ve got to get on the Maria and run for it,” he panted.  “There is no time to be lost.”

He had reached the top of the bank and was running towards the group at the tents.  And he actually infused me with some of his red-hot enthusiasm, for I hastened after him.

“But you can’t begin to get the Maria out before they will be in here,” I shouted.

He stopped short, gazed at the approaching boat, and then at me.

“Is that so?”

“Yes, of course,” said I, “they will be here in ten minutes.”

The Celebrity stood in the midst of the excited Four.  His hair was parted precisely, and he had induced a monocle to remain in his eye long enough to examine the Scimitar, his nose at the critical elevation.  This unruffled exterior made a deep impression on the Four.  Was the Celebrity not undergoing the crucial test of a true sport?  He was an example alike to criminals and philosophers.

Mr. Cooke hurried into the group, which divided respectfully for him, and grasped the Celebrity by the hand.

“Something else has got to be done, old man,” he said, in a voice which shook with emotion; “they’ll be on us before we can get the Maria out.”

Farrar, who was nailing a rustic bench near by, straightened up at this, his lip curling with a desire to laugh.

The Celebrity laid his hand on my client’s shoulder.

“Cooke,” said he, “I’m deeply grateful for all the trouble you wish to take, and for the solicitude you have shown.  But let things be.  I’ll come out of it all right.”

“Never,” cried Cooke, looking proudly around the Four as some Highland chief might have surveyed a faithful clan.  “I’d a damned sight rather go to jail myself.”

“A damned sight,” echoed the Four in unison.

“I insist, Cooke,” said the Celebrity, taking out his eyeglass and tapping Mr. Cooke’s purple necktie, “I insist that you drop this business.  I repeat my thanks to you and these gentlemen for the friendship they have shown, but say again that I am as innocent of this crime as a baby.”

Mr. Cooke paid no attention to this speech.  His face became radiant.

“Didn’t any of you fellows strike a cave, or a hollow tree, or something of that sort, knocking around this morning?”

One man slapped his knee.

“The very place,” he cried.  “I fell into it,” and he showed a rent in his trousers corroboratively.  “It’s big enough to hold twenty of Allen, and the detective doesn’t live that could find it.”

“Hustle him off, quick,” said Mr. Cooke.

The mandate was obeyed as literally as though Robin Hood himself had given it.  The Celebrity disappeared into the forest, carried rather than urged towards his destined place of confinement.