One man stood guard on each side of the house and a big crowd was packed in front.
“Something up,” Jack muttered to himself. “They evidently are convinced they cannot reach me this way and are going to try something else. I guess it’s up to me to get out of here very suddenly. But how?”
That was the question, and the boy gave it some reflection. Then, as he made another tour of the roof, a plan came to him. It was a desperate chance, but he could think of no other way of escape.
Making sure that the crowd was all in front, the boy ran quickly to the back of the house. There was a guard directly below him, but, as luck would have it, the man at that very moment was engaged in the task of lighting a pipe.
Jack acted without a pause. Swiftly and silently he lowered himself from the roof, hanging by his hands directly over the guard’s head. Then, giving himself a little swing outward, he dropped.
It was a long drop, but the lad had gauged the distance correctly, and the force of the fall was broken by the man below, upon whose shoulders the lad dropped like a human thunderbolt.
The man went to the ground without so much as a groan, Jack on top of him. Although somewhat shaken up by his fall, Jack did not lose his presence of mind for a single moment, and his hand clutched the guard’s throat, throttling any outcry.
Now Jack’s further resourcefulness became apparent. Glancing quickly about to make sure that no one was in sight—the walls of the house obstructing the view of those on the sides and in front—the lad lifted the guard bodily in his arms and carried him to a little shed in the rear.
Quickly he stripped the officer—for such his victim proved to be—of his uniform, and hastily donned it himself. Hurriedly he bound and gagged his captive, and then walked from the shed and took the guard’s place in the rear of the house.
And he arrived there not a moment too soon, for at that instant a band of soldiers appeared, bearing many ladders. These they leaned against the side of the house in different places, and one man mounted each, cautiously, for fear of being hurled back by the fugitive they believed to be on the roof.