“They sure are!” declared Jerry.
“And the nerve of them coming in here and demanding something to eat!” cried Bob, as if this was the highest crime of all. “I’m glad Hang Gow didn’t give it to them!”
“Guess he didn’t get the chance,” said Ned grimly. “But, say, if Noddy Nixon has kidnaped Bill he can have only one reason for it.”
“He can’t have done it to get a line on our mine,” said Jerry. “We’ve got too big a crowd of men here for him to try to buck up against.”
“No, it isn’t that,” Ned remarked. “But Noddy and his two cronies know that Bill has inside knowledge as to where the treasure chest went over the cliff. They want to get a line on that. So they have taken Bill away and they’re going to try to make him guide them to the spot. I guess Dolt Haven doesn’t know as much about it as he said he did.”
“Probably not,” assented Tinny. “It’s all a fairy story about that treasure chest, anyhow.”
“And do you think they really have taken Bill?” asked Bob.
“It looks so—his pipe being dropped and all that,” Jerry replied. “Bill was very careful about his pipe. Professor Snodgrass had hard work to borrow it that time he smoked the hornets.”
“Let me question Hang Gow a little more,” suggested Tinny.
The Chinese was feeling better now, and had recovered his nerve, so he was better able to tell what had happened. Piecing together his story, as drawn out by Tinny, it appeared that three men, surmised to be Noddy, Jack and Dolt Haven, had suddenly appeared at Leftover in the absence of the mine owners.