“They’ve robbed me!” he sobbed out, when the bottom of the basket was reached and showed nothing but rinds and fragments of rotten wood.
A whining sound came to his ear; and just then Phin said, “O, just look! what’s the matter with your dog?” Jack looked, and there, half hidden by the bushes, was Lion hanging by the hips from the forked limb of the log. He sprang to rescue him. The whiplash was tied in a tight knot, and out came the boy’s knife to cut it.
This part of the fun Hod Huswick, in his ambush, had not anticipated, and did not relish.
“Here! that’s my whiplash! don’t ye cut it!” he cried; and from the bushes leaped the bare legs with their flapping linen, to the no little astonishment of Phineas Chatford.
JACK RESCUES LION.
“I’ll cut it, and you too!” The whiplash was severed, and Jack, knife in hand, turned upon Hod. “What have you done with my money?”
“Hain’t done nothin’ with ’t,—I hain’t teched it.”
“Who has?”