“Git down-stairs!” he rasped. “You, Hampton, you got in here foist, but ya’ll stay where I can see ya from now on. G’wan! Move!”
The blue eyes narrowed at the dictatorial tone and the half-spoken accusation. But then Douglas smiled again—an exasperating smile.
“When I’ve fed the horse,” he singsonged. “Then, if I feel like it. But there, Uncle Eb, maybe you’d better do the feeding, now that you’re here. If I laid this gun down I might lose it. Some folks can’t be trusted.”
Uncle Eb cackled harshly. Bill moved his right arm quickly, but stopped it. Douglas still smiled, but his eyes were cold and his gun gripped in a ready-looking fist. Ward, whose head had risen again on the stairs, watched like a cat, one hand under his coat.
Deliberately Uncle Eb gathered a big armful of hay, crowded past Bill with it, dropped it on the open chute to the horse’s bin and stuffed it down with a small two-tined fork standing at hand. Then he returned to the stairs and clumped down them, Ward giving way but holding his position.
“After you, my dear Bill,” bowed Douglas. “Oh, don’t be afraid. The Whirl may jump on your neck one of these days, but not this afternoon. G’wan!”
At the patrolman-like twang of the last word Ward grinned slightly. He evidently had a sense of humor. Bill looked at him, at Douglas—then trod to the stairs and down. Douglas followed.
Below, the pair conducted a rapid but extremely thorough search of the ground floor. Meal-chests, barrels, stalls, the covert under the stairs—every nook and corner where a man could possibly be hidden was looked into. When they still found no sign of what they sought, they paused and looked hard at each other.
“Any cellar under here?” demanded Ward.
“If ye call a hawg-pen a cellar, yas,” snapped Uncle Eb. “Go look into it—waller round into it—ask the hawgs what they had for breakfas’—wait awhile an’ mebbe I’ll feed ye some swill along with ’em.”