“There’s a sort of store-room right back there,” said Morland. “It doesn’t have any windows, and the door only opens from this side. That’s where they kept me.”
“Then they must know it’s all right,” said the Saint and raised his gun and his voice a little: “Into the doghouse comrades.”
The men went in. It was rather a tight squeeze, but they all made it. Morland closed the door on them and slid a heavy wooden bolt into its socket.
Simon went up and inspected the fastening. It looked solid enough, but nine muscular Aryans were a slightly different proposition from one old retired dentist.
“Better give me a hand with the beds,” he said.
He hauled one cot out and set it against the door, facing out lengthwise. Between them, they jammed four more cots up against it in the same direction, until the line reached to within a foot of the far wall. The remaining space they wedged full of chests and chairs and other assorted furniture until it was certain that nothing less than a tank could have broken out of the back room.
Simon surveyed the barricade with approval.
“I can’t help thinking it’s going to be quite uncomfortable for them,” he remarked. “Rather like the Black Hole of Calcutta. But then, they’ll only appreciate Leavenworth so much more when they get there.”
It was then that he heard two muffled shots from a distance outside.
He snatched up the Tommy gun and ran out of the bunkhouse. Instinctively he headed towards the ranch building — there was no other place in the vicinity from which it was likely that the reports could have come. But after a few yards he paused. There was no other noise or commotion. The one lighted window in the ranch house still glowed steadily, a single blank square of yellow in the halftone dark.