“I’ll tell you what I’ll do,” Clay said, “you come on board the Rambler with me and we’ll give the map to Captain Joe, and then we’ll all go together and deliver it to Fontenelle. It seems to belong to him.”
“I think you’ll change your mind,” replied the other.
After a short whispered conversation with Steve and Ben, the man left the cavern. Clay would have given a good deal for some knowledge as to his objective point. He believed that the outlaws had a base of supplies other than the cavern on the peninsula, and he was wondering if the boys on the Rambler would be able to discover it.
After a time Ben began drinking from the bottle of liquor he had drawn from under the rug, and Steve, seeing that the fellow was drinking himself into insensibility, left the cave, first seeing that Clay was tied hand and foot and gagged with one of his own handkerchiefs.
The boy’s position was an uncomfortable one. He moved restlessly about, rolling toward the entrance as if in quest of fresh air. Ben arose and stood watching him drunkenly.
“You’re not so worse,” the fellow cried. “If I had my way, I’d get out of this mix mighty quick. I’m a kind-hearted man, kid! The drunker I get, the kinder I am.”
Clay was on the point of suggesting that he drink the remainder of the liquor in the bottle, so that he might be kind enough to untie him, but did not do so for obvious reasons.
The boy was in hopes that Ben would become too intoxicated to pay any attention to his movements, but he did not do so. Instead, he filled a cob pipe with villainous tobacco and sat down at the entrance to the cavern within a few feet of where the boy lay.
During all this time, the boy was wondering if Alex had gone back to the Rambler or whether he had trailed on after the men who had attempted his capture. In the latter case, the boy was evidently not very far away. He listened intently for some indication of the boy’s presence, but none came. He wondered if the boys on the Rambler would make an effort to find him before night set in.
And so, gagged and bound, he spent a long, painful day. No one came to the cave, and Ben was his sole guardian. The man became talkative after a while and discussed the streets of Chicago, which he seemed to know well, but became silent whenever an incautious word regarding the present situation came to his lips.