They crossed over to a corner of the room and threw back the corner of a rug. Where the baseboard was mortised at the corner there appeared to have been a patch put in. Ted placed his hand against this, near the top, and it tipped back. It was hung on a pivot, and, as its top went in and the bottom came out, there was revealed a boxlike receptacle about two feet long and six inches deep.
"This is a bully place," said Ted, placing the packages of money within it. "It is known to only five of us, and I'll bet that most of us have forgotten its very existence."
The board was turned back into place and the rug spread out again.
"Safe as in the Strongburg Bank," said Kit. "Well, me for the feathers. We're going to be kept humping to-morrow. Buenas noches."
In a few minutes the big ranch house was dark and quiet; every person in it was sound asleep.
Ted Strong had sunk into a deep and untroubled sleep, for his day had been very active, and he was tired when he lay down.
But he had not been sleeping more than a half hour when he found himself sitting straight up in bed, very wide-awake, and wondering why.
"Something wrong in the house," he muttered to himself.
He sniffed the air to discover the smell of smoke. But it was not that.
Had he locked up? He went over his actions just before retiring, and was sure that he had attended faithfully to everything.