“Correct!” agreed the saloon keeper. “You fellers want to be friends. It stands you in hand; for I’m going to hide you at his place for a couple o’ days or longer; we talked it over while comin’ down hyer. I’m goin’ to ask you to help him get that fool Dutchman and the woman up to his cabin, too. So we’ll have to hustle.”
“Changed your plans, eh?” asked Benson, rising.
“I had to. Cody is catching on. If he should find you in here it would land me, along with you—see? So I’ve got to get you out of here. He’ll raid this place again, in better fashion, before another twenty-four hours; and I reckon you don’t want him to ketch you in here any more than I do. That’s the way I look at it. If he should find you occupyin’ that room where you’ve been—and at the same time unearth the baron and the woman down below, I reckon it would be me for the jail, along with the rest of the bunch.”
It was singular, the influence the fat saloon keeper had over these men. Benson was the brainier man, yet he seemed willing to obey the saloon keeper’s orders.
The five men went down into the cellar, taking the back-cellar stairs, and carrying a lamp.
The place was nearly filled with barrels and casks, some empty, others containing liquors of various kinds.
Two of these casks the men rolled out of the way, under the saloon keeper’s instructions, when a small door was revealed.
This he opened. By stooping, the men passed through it into a small room. In that room the light of the lamp showed the baron and the woman, both trussed up in a painful manner.
The baron began to rave as soon as he saw them, for the stolid Dutch patience had at last given away.
“Cut it out, my friend,” said Uncle Sam. “You’re goin’ with me. If you do right, you’ll be treated right. But we ain’t goin’ to have any howling, understand, either here or on the street.”