"In a skiff, at the end of the pier. Let me go, Johnny, won't you? I'll never do it again, as long as I live."
"How were you going to sea?"
"In the Sweepstakes. We captured her, and she is ready and waiting now. Say, Johnny, why don't you answer my question?"
"Where have you been during the last two weeks?"
"On Block Island. We've got a harboring place there, near the shoals. O, now, Johnny, come back here and release me."
But the clerk was gone before the words were fairly out of Tom's mouth. He had heard enough to satisfy him, and he believed that prompt action on his part was all that was needed to insure the capture of the robbers.
"I'll run down to the vessels, in front of the elevator, and alarm the watch," soliloquized the clerk. "I'll ask one of the captains to send a boat's crew after the governor and his crowd, and then I'll raise men enough to handle the Sweepstakes. I'll start for the island in her, and the robbers, thinking it's all right, will come on board, and the first thing they know they'll be prisoners, and I'll have possession of the seven thousand dollars. That's the way to work it."
Fully occupied with such thoughts as these, Johnny pulled open the door and sprang out into the passage-way, where he came in violent contact with somebody. It was the governor, who, impatient at Tom's delay, had come up to see what was the matter with him.
"Hello, here, cap'n!" he growled. "Haint you got eyes that you can't see nothing? If you're all ready now, let's be off."
The clerk, recognizing the voice, turned instantly and ran into the store, banging the door after him. He might have escaped by going out at the other end of the passage; but his first thought was of his prisoner. If he left the store, the governor would, of course, go in and release Tom; and that was something Johnny did not intend he should do. "A bird in the hand is worth a dozen in the bush," thought he. "It is my business to look out for Tom, now that I have got him. The other robbers can be attended to at any time."