“Absolutely?”
“Even so, my lord,” said the sarcastic Prime. “Pile ahead with your show, and let the band resume its melodious strains.”
“Plucky, by Jove,” said Hale, turning to his friend Brown. “It’s a shame that such a man is not in the Secret Service. He would make a valuable member of the body. However, we must try to clean the rascal out, Charley.”
“What?” said Gorse.
“Be kind enough to hew down that young tree for me.”
“Certainly,” said Gorse, and seizing his ax he hastened to chop away at the tree indicated by Hale, which was nearly one foot thick, and about twenty feet or so in length.
Charley, an expert wood-chopper, hewed it down in a few minutes, and then Harry Hale turned to Frank.
“Do you think you could fix that battering ram between your horse and Gorse’s man, and smash that door in?”
“You bet,” cried Frank.
“Sartin,” said Charley, and the two young fellows seized upon it and swung the heavy beam between the two wagons, by means of strong, elastic bands.