"Got all the traps with you?"
"Sure!"
"Clap the bracelets on him, then. Now give me a second pair, and a strip of line. That's the stuff."
"Oh, I brought the whole shooting match," laughed Patsy.
"Good for you! Now mount to the box, and leave this dog to me. I'll return in half a minute."
Patsy climbed up to the seat from which Dalton had been so speedily snatched and overcome, and Chick now ran the rascal a rod or more into the woodland on the opposite side of the road.
There he threw him to the ground beside a small oak, around the trunk of which he quickly twined Dalton's legs, and then fastened them at the ankles with a pair of irons.
"I reckon you'll stay there quietly until I want you, barring that you pull up the tree," he grimly remarked, as he turned to hasten back to the carriage, in which he quickly resumed his seat.
A moment later Venner peered from the distant window—and was satisfied with what he saw.
Five minutes later he came striding down the walk and approached the carriage. Without a word to the driver, whom he supposed to be Dalton, he opened the carriage door and laid his hand on Chick's arm, at the same time pointing toward the house.