He rounded a bend in the tunnel faster than he planned and was through a door and into a small room before he realized what had happened! There he was and there was—Stanley, with a youngish mobster! Stan was tied with his hands behind him, and the gangster had a drawn automatic on a convenient table. The man, probably the Gagnon Dago had mentioned, went for the gun, but John had an arrow drawn back to the tip!
“Leave it alone!” ordered John, aiming for the man’s right arm.
But the hand was streaking for that gun and did not stop. His fingers closed over the weapon and he was drawing it back when the arrow twanged home! With a startled outcry of pain the man dropped the weapon, and grabbed for his arm with his left hand.
The arrow had punctured one of the muscles, and John covered the man with another arrow as Gagnon pulled the first one free of the wound. Being a muscle wound and the arrow having missed any arteries or veins, it hardly bled any, but was painful. The man turned a white face, almost chalklike, towards the youth.
“Give me your knife, and fast!” ordered John.
The man reached awkwardly for his pocket and drew out a knife. He opened it on order, wincing from the pain of his wounded arm, and cut Stanley’s ropes.
Stan’s bows and arrows were standing in the corner of that room and the G-man’s son, rubbing his arms quickly to restore the circulation, was shortly standing with drawn bow beside John.
“Tie him up, John, while I cover his face with this hunting arrow!”
Now, like most other young men, especially of his type, Gagnon was particularly anxious to keep his good looks, and the sight of that steel point robbed him of any desire to resist the ropes with which John now tied his wrists. And Gagnon was thinking fast. He voiced his thought in a moment.
“Listen, fellows,” said he, trembling, “I can’t let Dago and the others find me like this!”