"Confound you!" roared Kenworth. "I didn't get you, did I?"
"Not just yet," panted Ned, "nor for some time to come. You're my prisoner, and if you don't want to accompany me quietly I'll find means to make you."
Kenworth's reply was an odd one. He uttered a peculiar whistle.
"Now what's that for?" wondered Ned. The question had hardly taken shape in his mind before it was answered, and in a surprising manner.
A loop was thrown over him, he fell forward, and his arms were pinioned by an irresistible force to his side, while a knee pressed into the small of his back.
"Honorable capitan lie quiet? No?" came a voice in his ear.
"It's Saki! Let me go instantly," demanded Ned.
A soft, gurgling laugh was the rejoinder.
"Yes, me Saki all right, honorable capitan; but no can let you go. You lie down lilly while."
With a trick that Ned recognized as one employed by the jiu-jitsu expert he had vanquished in the Far East, the yellow-skinned rascal, as he spoke, threw Ned sprawling on his back on the sand. Before he could make any defense another loop was slipped over his legs.