“I reckon you ain’t got no sister!” said Williams.
“I see that our friend Williams is inclined to be a scoffer; and scoffers never come to any good end. Get over it, Williams.”
When he had shown them around the apartment and talked learnedly of his “secret process,” he was ready to go into the hidden room with them; the place that held his “mine.”
“That talk is my regular stock in trade, that I hand out to all the inquisitive people who come up here askin’ fool questions,” he explained; “you ain’t expected to understand it; nobody can. I don’t understand it myself; but it sounds good.”
Tim Benson smiled. Such work was of a kind that he could appreciate.
“Throw anything that seems to be high-browed at the average man,” he said, “and he’s ready to think that you know everything.”
“Same as you did to Matt Shepard, eh?” said Uncle Sam. “There was nerve for you, gents—the clear, wire-coated, fibrous article. I think I have some nerve myself; but Benson seems to hold the medal right now.”
Benson was flattered, and smiled.
The blond-haired man pushed on the hidden panel, and swung open the door leading into the black hole; then he took up his lamp again, and led the way into it.
“Right at my heels, gents. There’s nothin’ in here to bite ye.”