“You really can’t tell. From the looks of things, it seems as though they don’t use this floor.”
“Then why should the door be locked?”
“I can’t say. Let’s break in, so we won’t have any regrets.”
Wallace set to with his hatchet. Paul cautioned him to make less noise. But it was necessary to do a lot of chopping before the door would open. Wallace swung the door open and remained at the threshhold. Wallace gasped and Paul quickly reached into his pocket for the gun. They stepped into the room. Sprawled over on the floor was a man chained to a chair. Quickly glancing about to see if anyone else was in the room, they then hurried to pick up man and chair. Upright, the man’s head hung down and had every appearance of being dead. Paul put his ear to the man’s heart, listened closely for several seconds and then whispered, “Still alive.”
“Wonder who he is?” asked Wallace.
“Let’s first set him free.”
The man was chained hands and feet and then the chain ran several times around his body and the chair and both ends of the chain were held fast by a lock. Trying to break the lock was found to be futile. So Paul attacked one of the links with the hatchet. After removing the chains, they stretched the man out on the floor. Paul made a quick search through his coat pockets. From the right one the boy brought out a badge. Wallace craned his neck to see. It was a government agent badge.
“Do you think he is a real government agent?” whispered Wallace.
“Must be.”
“What’ll we do?”