"By the Lord!" muttered the Sergeant-Major, between clenched teeth, "the beggar's gone!"
Martin smiled cunningly.
"You think so? I don't! You see no trail going away—no. The beggar home, all right! But he play dead. No time get away, so he think: 'Pretend me gone. Foolum.' See?"
Light dawned on the Sergeant-Major's countenance.
"Now, listen: Dead snake always most bad snake. Always be more careful with dead snake. Make good plan now—he there, I bet you."
And so, assuming Dan at home, they made their plan. Keeping under cover, they crept to a point very near the shack. Sergeant-Major Whittaker posted Bland to cover the door from one hand, Martin from the other. To order the trader to come out was, they knew, quite useless. He would not surrender while the shack afforded him shelter. They must persuade him to admit them—then seize him. At the first sign of resistance, Martin and Bland were to shoot the man dead as he stood in the doorway.
"Come on, Adair," the Sergeant-Major smiled coolly. "You an' me must do the dirty work. Keep the bracelets handy."
So, their revolvers in their holsters, the pair of them approached the shack on the blind or windowless side. The sun was almost over the horizon. No sound, no movement betrayed a human presence in the shack. But one significant fact became obvious as they crept 'round to the front. The windows had been stoutly barricaded.
Close to the door they were, now—the air taut as a violin string.
The Sergeant-Major, motioning to Hector to remain where he was, strode boldly from cover and rapped thunderously on the heavy portal.