Just then Irv Strong thought of something.
“Suppose he gets desperate? He could easily set fire to things down there.”
“That’s so,” said Phil, who had just returned from the hold. “Bring the fire-extinguishers.”
By the time they got the four large carbonic acid receptacles a new thought had occurred to Ed.
“Bring an auger, boys. There’s one lying forward there. The big one.”
It was quickly brought, though none of the boys could guess what Ed intended to do. He took the auger, and quickly bored an inch hole in the scuttle. A flash and a bullet came through it, but nobody was hurt.
“Now, give me an extinguisher,” said Ed.
Putting the nozzle of the hose through the hole, he turned the apparatus upside down, and allowed its contents to be driven violently into the little cabin. When the first extinguisher was exhausted he turned on the hose of another, and after that of a third.
For a while the imprisoned man, shut up in a box ten feet by twelve and not over five or six feet high, indulged in lusty yells, but these soon became husky, and presently ceased entirely. The moment they did, Ed called out:—