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Page 30
The crowd gave way for her, and with curious pleased faces,
closed in again eagerly. She afforded them a new interest.
A young man in the uniform of an ambulance surgeon was
kneeling beside the mud-stained figure, and a police officer
was standing over both. The ambulance surgeon touched lightly
the matted hair from which the blood escaped, stuck his finger
in the eye of the prostrate man, and then with his open hand
slapped him across the face.
"Oh!" gasped Miss Forbes.
The young doctor heard her, and looking up, scowled
reprovingly. Seeing she was a rarely beautiful young woman,
he scowled less severely; and then deliberately and expertly,
again slapped Mr. Jerry Gaylor on the cheek. He watched the
white mark made by his hand upon the purple skin, until the
blood struggled slowly back to it, and then rose.
He ignored every one but the police officer.
"There's nothing the matter with HIM," he said. "He's dead
drunk."
The words came to Winthrop with such abrupt relief, bearing so
tremendous a burden of gratitude, that his heart seemed to
fail him. In his suddenly regained happiness, he
unconsciously laughed.
"Are you sure?" he asked eagerly. "I thought I'd killed him."
The surgeon looked at Winthrop coldly.
"When they're like that," he explained with authority, "you
can't hurt 'em if you throw them off the Times Building."
He condescended to recognize the crowd. "You know where this
man lives?"
Voices answered that Mr. Gaylor lived at the corner, over the
saloon. The voices showed a lack of sympathy. Old man Gaylor
dead was a novelty; old man Gaylor drunk was not.
The doctor's prescription was simple and direct.
"Put him to bed till he sleeps it off," he ordered; he swung
himself to the step of the ambulance. "Let him out, Steve,"
he called. There was the clang of a gong and the rattle of
galloping hoofs.
The police officer approached Winthrop. "They tell me Jerry
stepped in front of your car; that you wasn't to blame. I'll
get their names and where they live. Jerry might try to hold
you up for damages."
"Thank you very much," said Winthrop.
With several of Jerry's friends, and the soiled person, who
now seemed dissatisfied that Jerry was alive, Winthrop helped
to carry him up one flight of stairs and drop him upon a bed.
"In case he needs anything," said Winthrop, and gave several
bills to the soiled person, upon whom immediately Gaylor's
other friends closed in. "And I'll send my own doctor at once
to attend to him."
"You'd better," said the soiled person morosely, "or, he'll try
to shake you down."
The opinions as to what might be Mr. Gaylor's next move seemed
unanimous.
From the saloon below, Winthrop telephoned to the family
doctor, and then rejoined Miss Forbes and the Police officer.
The officer gave him the names of those citizens who had
witnessed the accident, and in return received Winthrop's
card.
"Not that it will go any further," said the officer
reassuringly. "They're all saying you acted all right and
wanted to take him to Roosevelt. There's many," he added with
sententious indignation, "that knock a man down, and then run
away without waiting to find out if they've hurted 'em or
killed 'em."
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