As they stood at the outer office entrance he suddenly pushed against Phil on one side and at the same time butted his head into Worth as forcibly as possible. Worth fell down while Phil, overborne by the weight of the suitcase, seemed in danger of stepping into the hole in front. The man, seeing a wild chance, drew back his foot, and was about to kick at the suitcase as if to send it through the hole in front.
“You would, would you?” grunted Billy, recovering in time to put his back against the door-facing and administer a push with his foot to the man, still standing on one leg in the act of kicking at the suitcase.
Down he went, the intended kick going wild. At the same moment Phil, having dropped the suitcase, sprang upon the man and with Billy’s ready aid, managed to bind both legs fast together, so that he lay helpless. After that the boys dragged their prisoner across the porch, then they carried him to where the car stood amid the shrubbery and placed him in the tonneau.
“Now, Billy,” said Phil, “you watch him close. I’ll go back, get that bag of his, shut the doors and come back. Don’t take your eyes off him. He’s tricky!”
And Phil again went back while Worth stood over the man watchful and wary.
He was a sullen looking chap, like and yet unlike the stranger whom, with his partner, Billy had briefly seen that day at Feeney’s. His eyes, roving about, avoided Billy, while he apparently looked for some further loop-hole that might offer another chance to resist or afford a possible escape.
“No good, old man,” remarked Worth, standing over him with the tube in hand, ready for any move the bound man might make. “You’ve got to go with us.”
“Look here!” suddenly said the fellow. “We’ve got money—me and my partner. Why not turn us loose on the quiet? We’ll make it all right—sure.”
“How do we know you’ll make it all right? Didn’t you shoot your own partner? He says you did. He calls you Dippy Quinn. That your name?”
“Oh, that’s nothing! I was reloading the pistol. It went off ’fore I knew a thing. That’s the real goods, boy! As I said, he and me have the dough. Two hundred of it’s yours, provided you’ll turn us loose—on the quiet.”