“You worked that game once,” roared Jimmie. “You got me geezled in the woods, and you got Ned lugged into the old mission.”
“Let me tell you,” Norman went on. “I was sent out into the mountains to look for you boys. I went off to the west because I didn’t want to find you. I thought you wouldn’t be in that direction.”
“That’s called ‘bunk’ in New York,” Jimmie insisted.
“Let the boy have his say,” Ned suggested.
“I went off to the west,” continued Norman, “and walked a long way. I didn’t want to go back to the mission at all, but I knew that if I didn’t something serious would take place in New York.”
“What do you mean by that?” asked Jimmie.
“I can’t tell you,” answered the boy. “I can only say that upon my keeping on good terms with Toombs and his gang depends the liberty and happiness of a person I am very fond of.”
Jimmie snorted his disbelief, but Ned motioned for Norman to go on.
“When I got high up on the hill, I came to a depression known to the mountaineers as the Devil’s Punch Bowl.”
“Wasn’t any punch in it, was there?” asked Jimmie, in derision.