CHAPTER XXXI.
LYNCH LAW.
During this brief conversation between Harvey Hamilton and Detective Pendar, the prisoner stood slightly to one side with his bare head bent and his face looking like that of some baffled imp of darkness. Not only had he lost his pistol and stiletto, but his hands were useless to him. The weapons seemed not to have been on his person at the moment of the explosion, for his captor had seen nothing of them. Pendar looked at the woman.
“Have you a clothesline?”
“Of course I have, and I need it too,” was the reply.
“Let me have it and I’ll pay you enough to buy three new ones.”
“That sounds sensible; what do you want to do with it?” asked Mrs. Waters, pleased with the chance of driving a good bargain.
“I wish to bind this scamp so fast that he will never be able to free himself.”
“‘Cording to what you tell me you oughter put it round his neck; I’ll give you all the help I can; yes, you can have the rope,” and she walked into the kitchen to bring the article, which, although knotted in several places, must have been fifty feet long.
“In there!” commanded the detective, motioning to Pierotti, who slouched through the door, the frightened little girl backing away and staring at him. Sullen, revengeful, but helpless, the Latin submitted to every indignity unresistingly. Pendar was an adept at such work and wound the rope in and out and around, again and again until every foot of it had been utilized, and the prisoner was bound so effectually that had he been one of the famous Davenport brothers he would have been unable to loosen his bonds.
“Now, Mrs. Waters,” said the officer when he had completed his work, “you needn’t have any fear of him.”