Nick flipped the coin toward the boy, who grabbed it out of the air and stowed it away in his pocket.
A minute later he was galloping up the road.
Several men, hearing the commotion at the blacksmith shop, had come in from the neighboring fields, and they were standing around, looking from Clancy to Nick, and trying to get the true inwardness of the affair from the blacksmith.
“Come outside,” said Nick, amiably, “and I’ll tell you all about it.”
And that’s what he was doing when Chick and Patsy bore down on him—smoking and enlightening the natives.
A few hurried words of explanation were exchanged by the detectives.
“Are all the grips belonging to the prisoners still in the Red Spider?” asked Nick.
“There are three here,” said Chick; “they’re big ones, and heavy as lead.”
“It was the heft that kept the grafters from lugging the grips along when they made their break for the timber,” put in Patsy.