"Gaspard Dufour, indeed!" Lucas exclaimed inwardly. "George Dunkirk, rather. This is a pretty kettle of fish!" He sent the letters up to room 24, to await the return of their proper recipient, and fell to reflecting upon the many, very many and very insulting things that he and nearly all the rest of the hotel guests as well had said in Dufour's hearing about publishers in general and about George Dunkirk & Co., in particular. His face burned with the heat of the retrospect, as he recalled such phrases as "sleek thief," "manipulator of copy-right statements," "Cadmean wolf" "ghoul of literary grave-yards," and a hundred others, applied with utter unrestraint and bandied around, while George Dunkirk was sitting by listening to it all! He called Ferris to him and imparted his discovery in a stage whisper. "The dickens!" was all that gentleman could say, as the full text of his address of the other evening rushed upon him. "It is awkward, devilish awkward," remarked Lucas, wiping his glasses and nervously readjusting them. A few minutes later two men rode up to the hotel. One of them was a very quiet-looking fellow who dryly stated that he was the high sheriff of Mt. Boab county. XIX. Meantime down the ravine in the obscure little still-house our pedestrians were held in durance vile by Tolliver and his obedient moon-shiners. It was a puzzling situation to all concerned. Far from wishing or intending to harm his prisoners, Tolliver still could not see his way clear to setting them at liberty. On the other hand he was clever enough to perceive that to hold them very long would be sure to lead to disaster, for their friends would institute a search and at the same time telegraph an account of their disappearance all over the country. "'Pears ter me like I've ketched bigger game 'an my trap'll hold," he thought, as he stood in the door-way surveying his victims. "What ye all a doin' a monkeyin' round' these yer premerses, anyhow?" he demanded. "W'y c'udn't ye jest wait 'll I sent for ye ter kem yer?" "It's a sort of surprise party, my dear sir," said Cattleton. "Don't you see?" "S'prise set o' meddlin' Yankees a foolin' roun' wher' they air not got no business at," responded Tolliver, "that's w'at I calls it." "Where's your pantry?" inquired Punner, "I'm as hungry as a wolf." "Hongry, air ye? What'd ye 'spect ter git ter eat at er still-house, anyhow? Hain't ye got no sense er tall? Air ye er plum blasted eejit?" Tolliver made these inquiries in a voice and manner suggestive of suppressed but utter wrath. "Oh he's _always_ hungry, he would starve in a feed-store," exclaimed Cattleton. "Don't pay the least attention to him, Mr. Tolliver. He's incurably hungry." "W'y ef the man's really hongry----" Tolliver began to say in a sympathetic tone. "Here," interrupted Hubbard gruffly, "let us out of this immediately, can't you? The ladies can't bear this foul air much longer, it's beastly."