“Why did you get up so early, Sam?” asked Bill.
“Oh, I have got a pain in my shoulder.”
“You're a liar!” says Bill. “You're afraid. He said he will burn you at a stake and you are afraid he'll do it. And he would, if he finds a match. Isn't it awful, Sam? Do you think anybody will pay money to get a little devil like that back home?”
“Sure,” said I. “Now, you and the Chief get up and cook breakfast, and I will go up on the top of this mountain.”
I went up on the peak of the little mountain and looked over the surroundings. I expected to see the dozens of villagers armed with scythes and pitchforks and looking for the kidnappers. But I saw a peaceful landscape with one man ploughing with a mule. “Perhaps,” said I to myself, “they didn't find out that the boy was kidnapped.”
When I got to the cave I found Bill backed up against the side of it, breathing hard, and the boy threatening to smash him with a rock half as big as a coconut.
“He put a hot boiled potato in my pants,” explained Bill, “and then smashed it with his foot; and I boxed his ears[9]. Do you have a gun, Sam?”
I took the rock away from the boy and of calmed them down.
After breakfast the kid takes a piece of leather with strings wrapped around it out of his pocket and goes outside the cave.
“What's he going to do now?” says Bill, anxiously. “You don't think he'll run away, do you, Sam?”
“Do not be afraid,” said I. “He doesn't seem to be a home boy. But we've got to fix up some plan about the ransom. Maybe his father didn't understand that he's gone. His parents may think he's spending the night with Aunt Jane or one of the neighbours. Tonight we must get a message to his father demanding the two thousand dollars ransom for his return.”
Just then we heard a kind of war-cry. It was a sling that Red Chief had pulled out of his pocket, and he was whirling it around his head.
I heard a sigh from Bill, like a horse gives out when you take his saddle off. A rock the size of an egg caught Bill just behind his left ear. He fell in the fire across the frying pan of hot water for washing the dishes. I dragged him out and poured cold water on his head for half an hour.
Bill sits up, touches his ear and says: “Sam, do you know who my favourite Biblical character is?”
“Take it easy