“No ye don’t, you critter!” grated the man. “You can’t get away like that! Quick, Huck—give a hand!”
Gasping for breath, the other man assisted, and, in a very few minutes, Merriwell was bound with his back against the powder barrel. His last hope of escape seemed gone.
“There,” said Dugan, looking at him with a leer of satisfaction, “now you are all right. There is enough powder in the barrel to blow you to kingdom come and destroy the hut. You’ll be blotted out of existence in a wink, and your friends may search for ye as much as they like. They’ll never find a trace to tell what became of ye.”
Cold drops of perspiration started out on Frank’s brow, but he tried to remain calm in the face of the terrible danger.
“All right,” he said, his voice held steady by a great effort. “Go ahead with your evil work. But your time will come! Just as sure as the sun shines, there will be an hour of retribution.”
“Sounds like some of your preaching, Huck,” said Dugan. “Can’t you offer up a prayer for his soul before we touch him off?”
“I won’t waste my breath!” snapped the other man. “Go ahead with the funeral!”
Dugan produced a fuse from his pocket. It seemed that he had brought it along with a view of using it there. One end of the fuse he thrust down through the bunghole into the barrel of powder. Then he took out a match and deliberately scratched it on the leg of his trousers.
The match flared up, and then the man touched it to the end of the fuse!