“Green hired us to do a little job for him.”
“What was it?”
“None of your business. Say, look here. I’ve told you all you wanted to know, more than I should. Now my mouth’s shut, see? I ain’t a goin’ to tell you nothin’ more. Not even if you beat my head in with your gun,” and the tramp relapsed into sullen silence. He seemed to be sorry now that he had gone so far in his answers.
“Phil, there’s one chance that all this may be a string of lies; and to be on the safe side, I’m going through the house. You keep this fellow under cover, and if anyone approaches, fire your rifle once, and back this fellow into the house, and make him lock the door. I’ll be with you, then, in a minute.”
Garry went into the house and made a systematic search of the house, starting with the top floor and the attic, peering into all the closets and any spot that would make a likely hiding place. He made no discoveries on the top floor, and descended to the main floor again. Here he found nothing, and was preparing to descend the cellar for a last look, when he saw the latch on the door being raised.
He stood stock still, and lifting his rifle, waited in silence.
The door opened slowly and noiselessly, and he was just about to order whoever was behind it to come out, as he was covered, when a head came cautiously around the door, and Garry dropped his rifle butt to the floor and began to laugh.
Instead of Green or one of his cohorts, as he had expected, the head belonged to no other than Dick!
“Say, I’m glad to see you” said Dick with a sigh of relief. “We did a fool thing in not deciding how long I was to wait without hearing from you; and you were so long that I thought you had been found and were tied up in some corner with Green and all his friends standing guard over you. So I came through the passageway to see if I could be of any help. What’s new? Have you found Ruth?”
In a few brief sentences Garry informed him of what had transpired in the past few minutes.