“Mebbe you’ll think different before we get through with you,” said Matt; “found the rope, have you, Jakey? All right. Stand by to tie his hands when I tell you; an’, Sam, you pull off his blue shirt. We won’t fool with him no longer.”
So saying the squatter arose to his feet, pulling Joe up with him. In a few minutes more the boy was standing with his face to a tree, and his hands and feet were fastened to it. But the work was not accomplished without a terrific struggle, I assure you. Joe Wayring fought desperately, and during the melee Jake was floored by a neat left-hander in the jaw, and Sam received a kick that doubled him up in short order. Of course this vigorous treatment added to their fury, but Matt was disposed to be hilarious over it.
“Well, then, what made you hide the money where he could find it, if you didn’t want to get a whack from his fist?” said he. “If you had brung it straight to me, like you oughter done, Joe never would a hit you.”
“That makes another thing that I’ve got to pay him for,” groaned Jake. “Hurry up an’ get through with him, pap, ’cause I want to get at him.”
“Then go an’ cut some good tough hickories, both of you. They’ll be back in a few minutes,” said Matt, as the boys took their knives from their pockets and disappeared from view, “an’ before they come, you had better make up your mind to tell me what you have done with that money. I’ve got all the proof I want that it was seed in your camp-basket yesterday.”
“Who told you so?” inquired Joe.
“I ain’t namin’ no names,” replied Matt; and then, for the first time, it occurred to him that if the valises were in Joe’s camp-basket yesterday they might be there yet, and he at once proceeded to satisfy himself on that point. The contents of all the baskets were quickly thrown out upon the ground, but the valises were not brought to light.
“I done that jest ’cause I happened to think of it, an’ not ’cause I expected to find the money,” Matt exclaimed. “I knowed you would hide it as soon as you got here. The boys is comin’. They’d like amazin’ well to larrup you on your bare back, an’ they will do it too; we’ll all do it, if you don’t quit bein’ so pig-headed an’ tell us right where we can go an’ find that money. Speak quick. Will you do it?”
“I tell you I don’t know any thing about it,” replied Joe, “and you can’t make me say any thing else. If any body told you a different story, which I don’t believe, he fooled you. That’s all I’ve got to say.”
Just then Jake and Sam came out of the bushes with their hands full of switches.