“Don’t you want something to eat? We have plenty of sandwiches.”
“Thank you, I don’t seem to have any appetite now,” was the despondent reply. “Perhaps later. But let me tell you what happened. I came out after specimens, as you know. I was up here on the side of the hill when I heard the rattle of wagon wheels on the road below.
“Looking down, I saw an ore vehicle, lying on the bottom of which was our friend, Bill Cromley, bound and gagged. Then I saw who was driving the horses. It was that Nixon chap, and I at once guessed something was wrong, remembering your talk of how he was trying to get Cromley to impart information about the location of the treasure chest.
“I rushed down the hillside, intending to rescue Cromley, for I guessed they had kidnaped him, but the three ruffians at once attacked me. I heard Jack Pender say: ‘Let’s gag him and tie him to a tree. We can’t take him with us, but we don’t want him loose to spy on us.’ The others agreed to this.
“They overpowered me in spite of my struggles, and, after putting in my mouth the piece of wood which prevented my exercising my vocal powers to any extent at all, they bound me to the tree.”
The professor was taking his own time and telling his story in his own way, but the Motor Boys knew from past experiences that the more they interrupted to ask questions the longer and more involved the explanation would be. So they let him proceed in his own way, by gestures cautioning Mallison to do the same.
“I could only guess at their object in capturing Cromley and in binding me,” went on Professor Snodgrass, “for I had no chance to ask them questions. They treated me roughly, but I could have forgiven that if they had not injured my specimens.
“But after they had bound me to the tree and made it impossible for me to call out, they deliberately and maliciously stamped on, trampled over, and broke and smashed all my precious specimens and boxes. I had left them on the ground while I rushed to the rescue of Cromley, and that Nixon chap, seeing them, sneered:
“‘We’ll make him wish he had let us alone!’ He stamped on and broke the first box and then he and Pender took turns in the work of devastation. I must say, though, that the third fellow did not join in this ruthless work. I must give him that credit.”
“Probably Noddy and Jack didn’t give him the chance,” said Jerry. “Those two have enough meanness under their hides for half a dozen Dolt Haven fellows.”