As he spoke a dry stick cracked sharply. Angus whirled to his right. Three black figures were almost on top of them. He had no time to dodge or brace himself. An arm swung around his neck, and he got his chin down just in time. He grasped the arm, tore it down across his shoulder, and would no doubt have broken it with the next wrench; but just then something descended on his head, and he went down unconscious in the dust of the trail.
He came back to the world of affairs with a ripple of artistic English swearing in his ears, and sat up.
"That you, Chetwood?" he asked.
"Right-o, old chap!" Chetwood replied, in tones of relief. "You've been in dreamland so long I was afraid the blighters had jolly well bashed in your coco."
"What happened?" Angus demanded.
"Well, it's a bit thick to me," the Englishman admitted. "There were four of the beggars, and three of them went for you while the other gave me all I could do. They floored you, and then rapped me on the head with a sandbag, I should say." He felt his cranium tenderly. "Laid us both out side by side like a pair of blinking babes in the wood. I came around first, and that's some minutes ago. You're sure you're quite all right, old man?"
But struck by a sudden, horrible suspicion, Angus put his hand in his pocket and gasped.
"What's the matter?"
"Matter enough," he replied. "They have rustled all the money I was holding for Paul Sam and the French boys!"
"My aunt!" Chetwood ejaculated. "We must have been followed."