The next instant the hand shifted from his ankle to his collar, and he was unceremoniously dragged forth from the enveloping folds of the tent cloth. Without an apology the one who had so effectively taken the boy from his position set him upon his feet.
"Hands off!" the lad cried with hot resentment at the treatment. "Leave go of me or I'll start working on you! Who are you, anyway?"
"That will do, young man," spoke a well-known voice, and Jimmie recognized von Liebknecht. "Why do you enter my tent so rudely?"
"Is this your tent?" asked Jimmie, wrinkling his freckled nose and blinking at the officer as he sparred for time.
"It was!" came the reply in icy tones, for von Liebknecht was plainly angered. "Why do you enter unannounced?"
"Well, if you'd ever been on Wall street," Jimmie began, with a twinkle in his eye, "you'd understand me perfectly when I say that I took a little flier in aeroplanes. The stock went up rapidly, and I felt the bottom drop out of the market. When I landed, my surprise was, to say the least, quite 'in tents'!"
"You speak strangely," von Liebknecht replied. "What do you mean?"
"Sorry if I say things you can't understand," went on the boy, "but you will have to let me tell the story in my own way. Not to change the subject at all, but I'd like to ask after my partner."
"Your partner?" was von Liebknecht's surprised question.
"Yes, the lad who came with me. Did you see anything of him?"