“Your what?”

McVay made a slight gesture of his shoulders, as if he were being a good deal tried.  “Oh, anything you like,” he said.  “I suppose you could lock me up in a closet.”

“I don’t think we need trouble to arrange the details,” said Geoffrey drily.  “But I’ll tell you what I will do.  After I get you safely in jail to-morrow, I’ll get a trap and go and look up this hut.”

“It may be too late then.”

“It may,” said Geoffrey, and continued to read.

Yet he had no further satisfaction in his book.  He knew that the burglar kept casting meditative glances at him as if in wonder at such brutality, and in truth, his own mind was not entirely at ease.  If by any chance the story were true,—­if there was a woman at his doors freezing to death, how could he sit enjoying the fire?  But, on the other hand, could any one have a more evident motive for deception than his informant?  What better opportunity for escape could be arranged?  It was so evident, so impudent as to be almost convincing.  What more likely for instance, than that the hut was a regular rendezvous for criminals and tramps, that by going he would be walking into the veriest trap?  Yet again there was the report confirmed by Harris’s story that a woman was in some way connected with these robberies.  The wind whistled round the house with a suggestion of difficulty, of combat with the elements, of actual danger, perhaps, that suddenly gave Geoffrey a new view of delay.  Had it not something the air of cowardice, or at least of laziness?  He found his eyes had read the same page three times, while his brain was busy devising means by which McVay could be secured in his absence—­if he went.

At length he rose suddenly to his feet.

“I’ll go,” he said, “but before I go, I’ll tie you up so safely that, if I don’t come back, you’ll starve to death before you’ll be able to get out or make any one hear you.  On these terms do you still want me to go?”

“Oh, yes, I want you to go,” said McVay, “only for goodness sake be careful.  If you should feel any temptation to lie down and go to sleep don’t yield to it; they say it’s fatal.  The great thing is to keep on walking—­”

“Oh, shut up,” said Geoffrey.  In view of the possibility that he was going to meet death at the hands of his fluent companion’s accomplices he found this friendly advice unbearable.

“This hut, I take it,” he said, “is an old woodcutter’s shanty in the north woods?”

“Yes, something over a mile and a half north of here.”

“I know the place,” said Geoffrey, “now come along, and we’ll see how I can fix you up until I come back.”

He had in mind a heavy upstairs cedar-closet.  It had been designed by a thoughtful architect for the storing of summer wearing apparel, and was strongly built.  It had besides the advantage of having a door that opened in and so was difficult to break open from the inside.  Here, having removed a complete burglar’s outfit from his pockets, Geoffrey disposed McVay, being met with a readiness on McVay’s part that seemed to prove either that he was sincere in his belief in Holland’s safe return, or else was perfectly confident of being able to open the door as soon as Geoffrey’s back was turned.