Jack hunted around and found some rope with which they temporarily bound the arms and ankles of their prisoner. That accomplished he made haste to secure all the papers as well as the ledger which Kearns had been so eager to destroy when realizing that at last his scorn for the minions of the law had reaped its inevitable result–the pitcher gone once too often to the well–and that his game was up.
“What next, Boss?” Perk was asking, “mean to kidnap both o’ these guys Jack?”
“It’ll make our chances better with one showing a yellow streak and turning on his employer for State’s evidence,” was Jack’s quick rejoinder, the idea being quite to Perk’s liking as he speedily made manifest.
“Jumpin’ jimcracks! we c’n tote the pair right nifty an’ I’m meanin’ to see that other guy gets all that’s comin’ to him, after that nasty crack on the coco he gimme with them irons. Say Jack, take a look at my head an’ see if it’s sound still–gee whiz! but it felt like the sky’d gone an’ dropped down on me.”
Jack speedily reassured him that although there was a lovely lump on the top of his head, it was nothing very serious. It was understood that there was not a minute to waste if they were wise. The Lockheed-Vega might blow in any time and give them trouble.
“We’ll get both the prisoners together and Perk, you stand guard over them while I taxi our boat around here so as to save ourselves the job of moving them along the trail. Is it all right with you, buddy?”
“Sure is,” came the ready reply. “I’ll start a little chin with our honorable guest here an’ see how he likes the idee o’ sittin’ up next Mr. Philip Ridgeway o’ the Treasury Department an’ findin’ out that this time he’s in the soup for keeps.”
Already the prisoner had recovered his customary nerve for on hearing what Perk was saying he broke out in a laugh.
“Looks a bit serious for me, I own up, boys,” he said. “I give you credit for being ace high above all your class, for you’ve played a clever game and beat me by a mile. So that was tear-gas you tossed into the room, was it?–thought I recognized the smell and I want to tell you, once that hits a chap’s eyes and he doesn’t care if a church steeple topples down on him, he’s that paralyzed.”
Jack lost no time in starting back to where the ship was hidden and having negotiated the distance along the perilous trail without running afoul of anything, he managed to toss the palmetto leaves overboard since there was no further necessity for camouflage. After coaxing his charge out of the narrow slip, and once on the open lake, he taxied down to the cove close to the coquina rock shack.