“I wouldn’t try the window,” said Chester, “because, even if you managed to get through the wire, you’d have a twenty foot drop. You can make all the noise you like, Sammy; the horses won’t mind and Perkins is being paid to look after you. By the way, what I started to tell you was that the Towners had decided to kidnap you, Sammy. It may be wrong to give them away, but there are some things I just can’t stand for!”
Chester went out grinning and the rest followed. The key turned in the lock and Sam heard them go shuffling downstairs, talking in low voices and laughing softly. He ground his teeth and clinched his hands. In a moment the footsteps died away, the door at the bottom of the stairs closed and the place was silent. Sam looked at his watch. It was one. There was almost an hour before the game would begin, he told himself, and in that hour he meant to get out of there.
But when he had made the rounds of his prison, tried the door, peered out of the window and measured the transom again he wasn’t so certain about it. The partitions were of inch boards, but without something more than his pocket knife he didn’t believe he could cut his way through them. Besides, even if he succeeded, there was Perkins to reckon with, and Perkins was a hefty, muscular-looking chap of something slightly less than six feet! He went back dejectedly to the bed. A minute or two later sounds reached him and the key turned in the door. Sam edged toward it, prepared to spring through if he had the chance. But it opened very cautiously and Perkins put only his head in.
“I’ve got your dinner, sir, out here. Keep over by the window and I’ll pass it in.”
“Your name’s Perkins, isn’t it?” asked Sam with an amiable smile. The man smiled back and nodded, pushing the door open and setting a well-loaded tray on the chair just inside.
“Perkins it is, sir. If there’s anything you’re wantin’ just holler; I’ll hear you, sir.”
“Perkins, I want to get out of here,” Sam replied ingratiatingly. Perkins wagged his head.
“Sure, I know,” he answered. “Mr. Chester told me you’d be wanting to go, but you was to be kept here until he got back.”
“You know you have no right to detain me,” suggested Sam, trying to speak sternly. Perkins nodded again, but quite untroubledly.