He hadn’t any illusions now. Clearly, nothing but a miracle would get him out of the web which had so entangled him the moment he had been placed in Dean Devlin’s car. Nothing save an almost impossible combination of favorable circumstances would make it possible for him to get word to Mr. Conne. And how, if it were true that Devlin kept them imprisoned until he saw fit to embark them on the dark, mysterious “job,” could those circumstances occur so that he might be of any real help to Carlton Conne? He despaired of any such good fortune.
The breeze was not strong enough to penetrate through the shuttered window now. Nothing but damp, humid heat found its way to his burning cheeks. He felt the stillness about the air augured a heavy storm and soon he heard thunder in the distance.
The buzz of crickets, the tin-like sound of locusts vied with the deep throated chorus of frogs about the house. Once an owl lent its eerie hoot to this droning night symphony and, as if in answer, another chorus of insects filled the air with dismal chantings.
Skippy stood it as long as he could, then got up and tiptoed to the window to get a breath of air. Through the bars he could see the quarter moon, a shimmering bit of silver light gleaming upon the swamp and here and there transforming it into pools of shining, black lacquer. Overhead, however, sullen clouds were slowly trespassing and it would be only minutes before the lonely place would be surrounded by darkness and storm.
He clung to one of the bars and peered down upon the roof of the woodshed just below the window. It would be an easy jump down there, he decided—easy, if it were not for the five long strips of iron that so effectually barred the way. Crude and amateurish though they looked, Skippy knew that they had been put there to withstand any such feeble attacks as his two bare hands might make upon them.
While he was digesting this fact he became aware of voices, Frost’s and Devlin’s, coming from the hall. He stepped toward the door noiselessly and pressed his ear close against it.
The men were not in the hall as he had at first thought, they were in their room with the door ajar. It was evident that they had intended to converse in whispers, but presently they were launched upon an argument and caution was forgotten.
“Tell me if you can,” Devlin was saying angrily, “what I’m going to do with those two Greeks, eh? It isn’t enough that you didn’t discover what they were before we brought them all the way here, but on top of it, you tell me I’ll think of what to do about them! I’ll think, eh?” He sneered. “All I can think of is that they’re Greeks and that I don’t look anything like a Greek or talk anything like one! How can I pass them off as my sons, eh?”
“Easy, boss, easy,” Frost said placatingly, “I didn’t know they was Greeks no more’n you. They was sentenced before I gets into court. The ones I counted on was that Nickie and that other kid, Dippy and that smart-looking youngster John Doe. You coulda knocked me cold with a feather when Fallon tags the Greeks along. There wasn’t no time to argue, was there?”
“All right—all right,” Devlin boomed. “Just tell me what I’m going to do with ’em! They can’t go back and tell what they’ve seen here and I’m not going to go to the trouble of getting them off my hands without getting some money out of it, that’s all there is to it!”