The Bishop's Jaegers by Thorne Smith

Author:Thorne Smith
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2011-12-09T02:34:11.367000+00:00

XII. From The Nowhere Into The Unknown

THINGS are not so desperate,' said Jo, breaking a heavy silence made a little less awe-inspiring by the heaving of the indomitable Bishop. 'Here we all are, the six of us. Three men and three women--just as it should be. There's Peter and myself, Yolanda and Little Arthur, and--'

'Just call me Liz,' supplied the retired model. 'Everybody does. Aspirin Liz--the former being one of my vices.'

'A name in a million,' said Jo. 'I like it. Well, then, there's Aspirin Liz and the Bishop. All cosy in a little boat.'

'With more than enough water under our feet,' put in Little Arthur miserably, 'to swaller us all in the blink of an eye.'

'Are you by any chance bracketing my name with that unwashed mite of a criminal?' Yolanda demanded arrogantly.

'I knew he was a criminal,' replied Jo, 'but I didn't know he was an unwashed one. How did you find that out?'

'I am accustomed to clean men,' Yolanda asserted coldly. 'Clean men with fresh linen.'

'Have you gone as far as that with Little Arthur already?' inquired Jo. 'You must have worked fast and deftly.'

'One needs only to look at the man to get an unpleasant conception of what lies beneath,' vouchsafed Yolanda.

'Is that any way to talk?' Little Arthur was on the verge of tears. 'Call yourselves ladies, do yer? If you'd like to know it, I am washed, and if I hadn't been looking for a---a--'

'For clean linen,' said Jo helpfully.

'Yes,' said Little Arthur. 'If I hadn't been looking for a fresh pair of those I'd of been taking the old ones off right now in the privacy of my own kip.'

'Do you?' inquired Jo.

'Do I what?' asked the pickpocket.

'Take 'em off?' the girl replied.

'Of course I do,' the small man lying stated.

'I didn't know,' Jo told him. 'Some men don't. You impressed me as being such a type.'

'Don't see why you should be discussing my habits at all right out loud in this fog and weather,' Little Arthur complained. 'Ain't we got no private lives?'

'Thus far,' observed the red-headed girl, 'my life has been much too private. I have decided to take steps.'

'We won't have any lives at all,' Peter put in, 'if you two charming young things don't abandon Little Arthur's drawers as well as what's in them, and listen like hell for the shore.'

'Well meant but indelicately expressed,' replied Jo. 'In moments of great danger the mind has a way of fixing itself on trifles. Should we sing, perhaps? People always do in little boats.'

'Not a bad idea, that,' Bishop Waller pronounced. Singing lightens the spirits. Why not try a snatch of a song while I row?'

'I know a song,' said Aspirin Liz.

'Let's have it,' suggested Peter.' Any one got a pill?' she asked.

'Might have one in my bag,' said Jo. 'I'll look.'

The girl succeeded in finding a rather soiled aspirin tablet and passed it to Liz.

'What are you going to use for water?' Little Arthur asked.

'Never use water,' she said. 'Keep it under my tongue.

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