Face and voice both seemed strangely familiar, yet, to save him, Overton could not place the fellow at that moment.
"One!" counted the leader, and Hal saw three rifle muzzles pointed at him.
"Two!"
"All right! I'm the 'coon. Be with you in a minute, Davy Crockett," laughed Sergeant Hal Overton.
It was hard luck, but the soldier boy felt that he had made all the fight that could be expected of any one. There seemed no sense in being killed for sheer stubbornness, now that he had not a ghost of a chance of fighting back.
Having once started groundward, Overton continued to descend rapidly.
As he reached the last limb on his descent he took a swift slide and landed among his captors.
"Good boy," mimicked the leader of the invaders. "Now continue to be sensible. Just lie down on your face and put your hands behind your back the way your two men did. Nothing happened to them and nothing worse will happen to you."
The wretch's words were smooth and oily. To Hal it really looked as though this fellow respected gameness enough not to take it out on a defenseless enemy.
So Hal lay face downward and gave up his hands for binding.