The fat man walked to the hearth. The prisoners were pushed after him.
“See here,” said Henderson, as his tall, dark jailer finished searching him and started a thorough investigation of the cabin. “What’s the meanin’ o’ this, anyway?”
“Why,” responded the fat man in a confidential tone, “we’re hungry, see? So we decided to ask ourselves to dinner with you and your buddy.”
Nick’s guardian came back from his inspection of the premises.
“Say, Cap,” he said, “there’s plenty of food, all right, but there ain’t no guns here.”
“Have you looked everywhere?”
“Sure, an’ so’s Tony. Why was you so leery o’ jumpin’ these holds?”
“What’d ye jump ’em for anyway?” grumbled Tony.
“I’ll answer both them questions while we rest a bit,” said the fat man indulgently. “As to jumpin’ ’em when they’re fightin’, Perry, you never want to do that. It’s takin’ a chance, because there’s generly a gun that both’s tryin’ to grab, an’ it may go off any time right in your face. An’ Tony, didn’t I give you my reasons for jumpin’ ’em at all before we got here? You’ll know when you’ve been workin’ at this work as long as I have that news can travel fast—mighty fast. How was we to know they wouldn’t recognize us, from a description or somethin’? How was we to know one of ’em wasn’t a bull? An’ lastly, how was we to know but what they might try to stick us up, if we didn’t get the hop on ’em—an’ us just oozin’ cash? We couldn’t answer a one of them questions ’til we seen what was what, could we? Play it safe, boys,” he ended, patronizingly conscious of his superior astuteness, ‘an’ you’ll always come out on top, even if you do make it unpleasant for the other feller sometimes. See?”
He teetered ponderously on the heels of his moccasins and drew forth a silver case.