“Pry him loose!” shouted Norman, half laughing at the predicament in which he had been discovered, “and I’ll tell you all about it.”
“Yes you will!” shouted Jimmie. “You’ll tell us another pack of lies and get us into more trouble. Why,” he went on, “I wouldn’t believe you if you said that round thing up there in the sky is the moon.”
“Get up,” Ned advised, “and give the boy a chance.”
Jimmie arose, reluctantly, and Norman soon got to his feet.
“I said I’d tell you all about it some day,” Norman began, “and I’m going to do it right now!”
“Don’t work your imagination overtime!” scoffed Jimmie.
“Go on!” Ned suggested. “Say what you have to say. But let me tell you this,” he went on, “your story will have to be pretty straight, and not include any excursions into the land of the enemy, in order to be believed. You must remember that we’ve had trouble following your steers.”
“Don’t you believe a word he says!” almost shouted Gilroy, thinking only of his own inconvenience. “It was his fault that I was led to that awful Devil’s Punch Bowl. I’ll never get over that experience as long as I live! It was horrible—beyond belief.”
“Go on, Norman,” Ned advised. “Make it short!”
“I told you once,” the boy began, “that something terrible would happen to a person in New York if I ever gave Toombs any cause to believe that I wasn’t perfectly loyal to his interests.”