“Listen, young feller. This ain’t no joke. Whether or not you go back at all ain’t worrying me, but I’ll tell you this much. You write that letter and say in it that if your folks don’t do as you tell them to, we’re going to shoot you to-morrow. Mebby we’ll do it anyway, and that’s what’s coming to you if you don’t write. Will you write the letter?”
“I’ll write it,” agreed the fat boy. “Give me something to write with.” Stacy labored over that letter, and his forehead and face were wet with perspiration while he was doing it. If he failed to convey the message, he believed the bandits really would make way with him, and if the Overlanders did not obey the order of the bandits, he was positive the bandits would carry out their threat. For these reasons Stacy Brown took more care in composing that letter than he had ever done before in writing a letter.
It was this message that, some time later, landed in the camp of the Overlanders on the flaming arrow, shot to them by a half-breed Indian.
“Read it,” commanded the bandit.
Stacy did, whereupon the bandits with heads close together read it over laboriously, one holding the message close to the fire for better light. The one who appeared to be the leader handed it to a companion.
“See that the ‘squaw-man’ pushes that through by the air road,” he ordered. “It’s got to go through in a hurry or somebody’ll suffer. Git!”
“Cap’n!” cried a voice, and a man dashed around the corner of the rock that protected the bandits. “He’s gone! He’s vamoosed. Don’t know how, but some varmint cut the ropes and let him out.”
“Gone! Go after him, men! What are you standing ’round here for? Get him, dead or alive! Nail that boy first! Never mind, I’ll do it. I’ll—!” The bandit paused suddenly and a blank look appeared on his face. “Whe—whe—where is he?”
Stacy Brown was not there. He had taken advantage of the interruption, and bounded away.
“You need a change, Stacy Brown, and you’re going to have it, if your legs hold out,” growled the boy as he bounded away into the forest.