ht was out then, and the cloths were taken off my
head. Then that sickening gag was jammed into my mouth."

"Didn't you offer any kick?" inquired Dan.

"Where was the use?" sighed Greg. "I knew that men who had gone to all
that trouble to bother me wouldn't waste any time listening to what I
might have to say."

"Then you don't know," inquired Dick, "if Dexter and Driggs were the
men?"

"They didn't speak once, from the time they grabbed me up to the time
when they left me in the cave," Greg answered. "Hours after that I must
have fallen asleep. I woke up to hear their voices a little way off.
They were talking in whispers. I couldn't hear all that was said, but
I'm certain in my own mind that the two were Dexter and Driggs."

"Did you make out anything that they were talking about?" pressed Dick.

"Here and there I caught some of it. I heard one man scolding the other
about throwing bricks and shying a stone; and so that must have been
what happened to you, Dick, and to you, Dave. I'm pretty sure it was
Dexter who was doing the scolding. Later I heard him say it was foolish,
and this carrying me off was much more to the purpose--that a thing like
my being carried away would do a heap more to 'scare that woman' and
make her understand that she had some one she couldn't afford to fool
with. Next the other man broke in and said that lugging me away was
foolish, and only a cause of trouble. But the other man broke in, with a
laugh, and said he'd make 'that woman' pay handsomely to have me set
free. He said she had always been a tender-hearted woman, and would
spend plenty of money to save the life of a boy who had helped her. Then
the two men, I judged from the sounds, left the cave. Any way, I haven't
heard any sound of them since then. I----"

Here Greg stopped suddenly, clutching at a tree that he was passing.

"Fellows, I feel about all in," he remarked brokenly. "I'm awfully
dizzy, too."

"You're played out, starved and all used up--that's what ails you,"
exclaimed Dick sympathetically. "We'll halt here and give you a chance
to rest."

In five minutes Greg declared himself fit to go on again. Dave and Dick
walked on either side of him, half supporting him.

"There's a house ahead, and a telephone wire running into it," said
young Prescott. "We'll try to get that far, and then we'll telephone
into Gridley."

That much of the trip was made, with a couple of short halts for rest.
Dick went up to the front