Johnny had got a little more of that gas than he thought. He did not lose consciousness, but he did have only a hazy notion of that which went on about him. It will always remain so--how the other members of the party came swarming out, how they found four members of the "Massacre Parade" prostrate on the snow, and Spider beside them on the ground with a broken arm--all this will always be a dream to Johnny. So too will be the story of how Drew and Tom went after the missing Iggy, who was not one of the four under the tree, and how they found him waiting in a high-powered car, and, having been fired upon, how they mowed him down with the very machine gun that had been loaded for the purpose of massacring women, men and girls alike. The effect of the gas did not last more than twenty minutes. The words used by the four would-be savage massacre men when they found handcuffs on their wrists and clothes-line rope bound round their legs, were scarcely in keeping with the spirit of Christmas. It will not seem strange that no one cared. As for Spider, he had some explaining to do. When a doctor had set his broken arm and he had fully recovered from his share of the gas, he told a strange story. He had caught a glimpse of someone dodging behind the old barn. Putting the whole thing together, he had decided that the men with machine guns would take their stand behind the giant cottonwood. Its thick base would offer perfect protection from bullets. "I thought," he went on, "if only I can beat them to the tree and climb it, with that gas bomb on my back, I'll be in a position to put them all to sleep at once. There wasn't a minute to lose, so, without saying anything, I made a dash for it." "But it's twenty feet to the first branch!" Johnny protested. "How'd you make it?" "The bark of that old tree," said Spider with a smile, "is like the edge of inch-thick boards sticking out. Nothing easier than getting a grip and going up." "For you," Johnny agreed. "But you were found on the ground," he objected. "Things didn't go just right." Spider indulged in a wry smile. "I got up the tree all right. They did their part, came and got under. Then I saw something I hadn't counted on--saw the tops of heads, yours and Alice's by that window. "Ten seconds more, and they'd have riddled you with bullets. Guess I got excited; must have moved. Anyway, one of 'em spotted me and fired. "Bullet hit my arm. Lost my balance, and down I came, gas bomb and all. The bomb burst all right. And, well, you know the rest." "Alice!" Johnny was looking into the little Canadian's eyes. He was thinking, "What if that machine gun had stuttered just once!"