“Well,” said Zip, surprised off his guard, “if you have known about our Order and the dynamite we are producing, I suppose you know where we are storing it and all the rest of it.”
“I am not telling anything I know,” said Dee. He had learned what he wanted to know from Zip’s loose tongue. But the man’s next words chilled him.
“I was sent up here to tell you that you will have to behave pretty well if you hope ever to get out of this,” he said. “Your life hangs on a thread, and a thin one. De Lorme would have killed you tonight if I had not begged for your life. I may as well tell you that you are a prisoner, and your best chance is to behave and make no trouble. I will bring your breakfast to you in the morning.”
“All right,” said Dee. “Leave it on the stairs. I don’t want to talk to you or see you again.”
“Keep talking like that and you won’t get any breakfast,” growled Zip sullenly, and left.
Dee found some extra bedding and made himself a very comfortable bed on the floor, where he slept soundly until morning. The first thing he heard was the key turning in the lock as Zip placed his breakfast on the stairs and retreated. The attic had been intended for servants’ quarters. Dee explored and found in one end a small bedroom and a decent bathroom. He ran a cold bath and, plunging in, felt fit for any fate. Next he found a pile of magazines that had evidently been left by the former owners. He looked at his tray and thanks to Anna, began to think that his imprisonment was not to be painful at least. By afternoon, however, time commenced to drag. Three or four times he had heard Bill and Eddie whistling down in the street. The whistle had a peremptory note. Dee wondered what was up.
He went to the window, but the screen was nailed in and he was afraid to call. And the boys did not look up. It was a tall house. By five o’clock Dee was walking the floor. When about six Zip came with his supper and peered at him over the top step, Dee refused to speak.
“All right!” said he. “Tomorrow you go on bread and water, young fellow, and you will find it down here at the door. I won’t come a step for you until you come off your high horse.”
“There is water up here,” Dee said.
“Bread it is, then. As soon as you act decently you shall have more. We are pretty busy downstairs. When it comes the thirteenth, just listen and you will hear some noise.”