“Get up, Jared!” said the scout leader, shortly.
Andy gave a grunt of displeasure. He could guess what Rob was about to do, and felt like expressing his disgust, though it was seldom any of the boys ventured to differ with Rob, such confidence did they have in his long-headed policies.
Hiram simply contented himself with shrugging his shoulders. If Rob considered it best that they let the contemptible sneak thief off, after catching him in the very act as it were, well, it must be all right. Scouts were taught that when a foe was on his back and begging for mercy they must not be too hard-hearted. Jared was deceiving them, Hiram felt sure of that, but after all why should they bother with punishing him any further?
“Are you meanin’ to let me go, Rob?” quavered the fellow, as he managed to get upon his feet, with the four scouts clustered around him.
“Yes, because we haven’t lost anything through you as far as we can find out,” the scout leader told him, at which Jared’s face lost some of its strained look, and Andy thought he caught some of the old-time crafty gleam in his shifting eyes.
“I give you my word for it, Rob, I never took a single living thing,” he hastened to say.
“Well, we’ll make sure of that by taking a look through your pockets!” declared Rob, sternly. “You don’t seem to like that, do you? But make up your mind that if you start to show the first sign of resistance we’ll not only pile on you, but hand you over to the police afterward without listening to any more promises. Andy, you tap his pockets, and see what he’s got.”
Andy did not hesitate an instant; indeed, to see the way he started in one might believe this was an avocation with the scout, and that he had been employed a long time at police headquarters searching the pockets of prisoners before they were thrust into cells.
A number of things were brought to light, which did not possess any particular interest for the scouts. When, however, from an inside pocket Andy drew a roll of bills, fastened with a rubber band, Tubby was heard to give a “whee!” and Hiram nudged Rob in the side as if to say: “See how he yarned when he vowed he wanted to get back on the farm, but didn’t have the railroad fare East!”
Andy deliberately proceeded to count the contents of the roll, while the wretched owner followed his every move, as though he feared that by some hocus-pocus or sleight of hand process, with which he himself was possibly familiar, some of the money might take wings and fly away.