27
CHAPTER IVAN OLD-TIME ENEMY
“New engine, lad?”
“Not at all, Mr. Griscom, as you well know,” answered Ralph.
The veteran engineer chuckled, but he continued looking over the locomotive with admiring eyes.
The young fireman had come to work early that afternoon. The roundhouse men were careless and he decided to show them what “elbow grease” and industry could do. In an hour he had the old freight locomotive looking indeed like a new engine.
They steamed out of the roundhouse and were soon at the head of their freight train.
“I wish I had a little time to spare,” said Ralph.
“Half-an-hour before we have to leave, you know, lad,” said Griscom. “What’s troubling you?”
“I wanted to see Bob Adair, the road detective.”28
“About the silk robbery?” inquired the engineer with interest.
“Yes.”
“Something new?”
“Considerable, I think.”
“You might find him in the depot offices. Run down and see. I’ll attend to things here.”
“Thanks, Mr. Griscom.”
Ralph hurried away from the freight train. He wished to report about the discovery of the silk, and hunt up Zeph Dallas at once.
“I hardly believe the farmer boy a thief,” mused Ralph, “but he must explain his possession of that silk.”
The young fireman did not find Adair at the depot, and came back to the engine to discover Jim Evans lounging in the cab.
“Been helping Griscom out,” grinned the man.
“Well, get out, now,” growled Griscom. “Time to start up. There’s the signal from the conductor. That man has been hanging around the engine ever since you left,” the old engineer continued to Ralph, “and he is too good-natured to suit me.”
“Nothing out of order,” reported the youth, looking about the cab.
“Now, lad, for a run on time,” said Griscom.29“This run has been late a good deal, and I don’t want to get a bad name. When I ran the Daylight Express it was my pride and boast that we were always on time to the minute.”
They made good time out of Stanley Junction to Afton. Ten miles beyond, however, there was a jolt, a slide and difficult progress on a bit of upgrade rails.
So serious was the difficulty that Griscom stopped the train and got out to investigate. He returned to the cab with a set, grim face.
“Grease,” he reported; “some one has been tampering with the rails. Spite work, too.”
There was fully an hour’s delay, but a liberal application of sand to the rails helped them out. Five miles later on the locomotive began to puff and jerk. With full steam on, the engine did only half duty.
“Water gauge all right,” said Ralph. “I don’t understand it.”
“I do,” said Griscom, “and I can tell it in two words—Jim Evans.”
“Why, what do you mean, Mr. Griscom?”
“He didn’t come into the cab for nothing. Yes, we are victims of the old trick—soap in the water and the valves are clogged.”
“What are we going to do about it?” inquired Ralph anxiously.30
“Pump out the water at the next tank and take a new supply on.”
There was a further delay of nearly two hours. Once more they started up. Ten miles from Dover, a few seconds after Ralph had thrown in coal, a terrible explosion threw the fire cover open and singed and burned both engineer and fireman.
Griscom looked angry, for the fire now needed mending.
“Lad,” he said grimly, “these tricks are done to scare you and delay the train.”
“I am not scared one particle,” retorted Ralph, “only this strikes me as a dangerous piece of mischief—putting explosives in among the coal.”
“Jim Evans did it,” positively asserted Griscom. “That’s what he sneaked into the cab for, and he has confederates along the line.”
Ralph said nothing but he resolved to call Evans to account when he returned to Stanley Junction.
They were over an hour late on the run. Returning to Stanley Junction, they were delayed by a wreck and the time record was bad at both ends of the line.
“I don’t like it,” said Griscom.
“We’ll mend it, Mr. Griscom,” declared the young fireman, and he did not go home when they31reached Stanley Junction, but proceeded at once to the home of Jim Evans.
Ralph knocked at the open door, but no one answered the summons and he stepped to the door of the sitting room.
“Any one here?” he called out through the house.
“Eh? oh—no,” answered a muffled voice, and a man in the adjoining room got up quickly and fairly ran out through the rear door.
“That’s queer,” commented Ralph. “That man actually ran away from me.”
“Ma has gone after pa,” lisped a little urchin in the kitchen. “Man wants to see him. What for funny man run away?”
Ralph hurried past the infantile questioner and after the object of his curiosity.
“Yes, the man did look funny, for a fact,” said Ralph. “He was disguised. There he is. Hey, there! whoever you are, a word with you.”
He was now in close pursuit of a scurrying figure. The object of his curiosity turned to look at him, stumbled, and went headlong into a ditch.
Ralph came to the spot. The man lay groaning where he had fallen.
“Help me,” he muttered—“I’m nearly stunned.”32
“Why!” exclaimed Ralph as he assisted the man to his feet, “it is Gasper Farrington.”
It was the village magnate, disguised. He stood regarding Ralph with savage eyes.
“I thought you had gone to Europe, Mr. Farrington,” said Ralph.
“Did you? Well, I haven’t,” growled Farrington, nursing a bruise on his face.
“Are you going to stay in Stanley Junction, then?”
“None of your business.”
“Oh, yes, it is,” retorted Ralph quickly. “You owe us thousands of dollars, and we want it.”
“You’ll collect by law, then. I’ll never give you a cent willingly.”
Ralph regarded the man thoughtfully for a minute or two.
“Mr. Farrington,” he said, “I have come to the conclusion that you are trying to make me more trouble. This man Evans is up to mischief, and I believe that you have incited him to it.”
The magnate was silent, regarding Ralph with menacing eyes.
“I warn you that it won’t pay, and that you won’t succeed,” continued Ralph. “What do you hope to accomplish by persecuting me?”
The old man glanced all about him. Then he spoke out.33
“Fairbanks,” he said, “I give you one last chance—get out of Stanley Junction.”
“Why should I?” demanded Ralph.
“Because you have humiliated me and we can’t live in the same town together, that’s why.”
“You deserved humiliation,” responded Ralph steadily.
“All right, take your own view of the case. I will settle your claim for five thousand dollars and pay you the money at once, if you will leave Stanley Junction.”
“We will not take one cent less than the full twenty thousand dollars due us,” announced Ralph staunchly, “and I shall not leave Stanley Junction as long as my mother wants to live here.”
“Then,” said Gasper Farrington, venomously, as he walked from the spot, “look out for yourself.”
Ralph went back to the Evans home, but found only the little child there. He concluded he would not wait for Evans that evening. The discovery of his old-time enemy, Farrington, had been enlightening.
“I will have a talk with mother about this,” he mused.
When Ralph reached home a surprise greeted34him. The little parlor was lighted up, indicating a visitor. He glanced in through the open windows.
The visitor was Zeph Dallas, the farmer boy.
35
CHAPTER VON SPECIAL DUTY
Ralph entered the house glad of an opportunity to interview the farmer boy, who had been in his thoughts considerably during the day.
“Mr. Dallas, this is my son, Ralph,” said Mrs. Fairbanks, as the young fireman came into the parlor.
The visitor arose from his chair in an awkward, embarrassed fashion. He flushed and stammered as he grasped Ralph’s extended hand.
“Brought you a sack of potatoes and some apples,” he said. “Neighbor gave me a lift in his wagon.”
“Is that so?” returned Ralph with a friendly smile. “Well, Mr. Dallas, I am very glad to see you.”
“Gladder than you were last time, I reckon,” said Zeph. “Say, I—I want to say I am ashamed of myself, and I want to thank you for all you did for me. It’s made me your friend for life, so I came to ask a favor of you.”36
This was rather a queer way of putting the case, thought Ralph, and the fellow blundered on.
“You see, Mr. Ames, that’s the man who hired me, found out about my doings down here at Stanley Junction, and he has set me adrift.”
“That is too bad,” observed Ralph.
“No, it ain’t, for I deserve better work,” dissented Zeph. “They say you’re dreadfully smart and everybody’s friend, and I want you to help me get where I want to get.”
“All right, I am willing to try to assist you.”
“I don’t know exactly which I had better do,” proceeded Zeph—“become a chief of police or a railroad conductor. Of course, the man who speaks quickest and will pay the most money gets me.”
Ralph concealed a smile, for Zeph was entirely in earnest.
“Well, you see,” remarked the young fireman, “it is somewhat difficult to get just the position you want without some experience.”
“Oh, that’s all right,” declared the farmer boy confidently. “I’ve thought it all out. I once watched a conductor go through a train. Why, it’s no work at all. I could do it easily. And as to being a detective I’ve read lots of books on the subject, and I’ve even got some disguises I made up, in my satchel here.”37
“Oh, brought your satchel, too, did you?” observed Ralph.
“Why, yes, I thought maybe you’d house me for a day or two till I closed a contract with somebody.”
The fellow was so simple-minded that Mrs. Fairbanks pitied him, and, observing this, Ralph said:
“You are welcome, Zeph, and I will later talk over with you the prospects of a situation.”
The visitor was soon completely at home. He ate a hearty supper, and, after the meal, took some home-made disguises from his satchel. The poor fellow strutted around proudly as he put these on in turn.
“Old peddler,” he announced, donning a skull cap, a white beard made out of rope, and a big pair of goggles. “Tramp,” and he put on a ragged coat and a torn cap, and acted out the appearance of a typical tramp quite naturally. There were several other representations, but all so crude and funny that Ralph with difficulty restrained his merriment.
“How will it do?” inquired Zeph, at the conclusion of the performance.
“You have got the elements of the profession in mind,” said Ralph guardedly, “but there is the practical end of the business to learn.”38
Then Ralph seriously and earnestly told his visitor the real facts of the case. He devoted a full hour to correcting Zeph’s wrong impressions of detective and railroad work. By the time he got through, Zeph’s face was glum.
“Why, if what you say is true,” he remarked dejectedly, “I’m next to being good for nothing.”
“Oh, no,” said Ralph, “don’t you be discouraged at all. You have the starting point of every ambition—an idea. I myself do not think much of the detective line for one as young as you are. As to railroading, I can tell you one fact.”
“What’s that?” interrogated Zeph dreamily.
“You must begin at the bottom of the ladder and take one step at a time—slow steps, sure steps, to reach the top.”
“You’re a fireman, aren’t you?” asked Zeph, admiringly.
Ralph answered that he was, and this led to his relating to the curious and interested Zeph the story of his career from roundhouse worker and switch tower man to the present position.
“It’s fascinating, ain’t it?” said Zeph, with a long-drawn breath, when Ralph concluded his recital. “I reckon I’ll give up the detective idea. Can you help me get a position in the roundhouse?”
“I am willing to try,” assented Ralph. “You39are strong and used to hard work, and that means a good deal in the roundhouse service.”
Ralph suggested a stroll before bedtime. Zeph was glad for the exercise. Once they were outside, Ralph broached a subject he had been thinking over all the evening.
“Zeph,” he said, “I want to ask you a very important question.”
“What is that?”
“You remember the day I kept your team for you?”
“I’ll never forget it.”
“You missed a package that had been under the feed bags when you came to leave town?”
“Yes, and that’s why I am here,” said Zeph. “Old Ames was almost ready to discharge me for letting those men at the hotel give me drink I had never tasted before and getting in that fix you found me in, and for losing some of the apples, but when he found out that I had lost that package, he was nearly wild.”
“Was there something so valuable in it, then?”
“I dunno. I only know I was told to be sure I kept it hidden and safe till it was delivered to a fellow named Evans in town here.”
“Jim Evans?”
“Yes, that’s the full name.”
Ralph looked pretty serious.40
“You see, old Ames himself didn’t send the package,” went on Zeph. “It was brought to the house by a fellow who had hired a team from Ames one day last week. Dunno who he is, dunno where he lives, but I can describe him, if you are interested.”
“I am interested, very much so,” assented Ralph.
Zeph went on to describe the person he had alluded to. By the time he had concluded, it was evident to Ralph that the sender of the package was Ike Slump.
The young fireman took Zeph back to the house but did not enter it himself.
“I will be back soon, Zeph,” he said, “I have some business down town.”
Ralph went at once to the home of Bob Adair.
“Want to see me, Fairbanks?” questioned the brisk, wide-awake railroad detective, as Ralph was shown into the room where he was busily engaged in packing a satchel.
“Yes, Mr. Adair, about the silk robbery.”
“Oh, that mystery,” nodded the detective. “I spent two days on it, and didn’t find a clew.”
“I had one, but failed to find you,” explained Ralph. “I’ll tell you all about it now.”
“Quick work, then, Fairbanks,” went on Adair,41“for I’m due for a special to the city. Big case from the General Superintendent.”
Ralph rapidly related all he had learned. Adair listened intently. He reflected for a moment or two after the young fireman had finished his recital. Then he said:
“Fairbanks, this is of great importance, but I can’t neglect the city case. You helped me on another similar case once.”
“Yes,” said Ralph.
“Also aided me in running down those switch tower wreckers.”
Ralph nodded.
“Good work, and you did nobly in those affairs. Let me think. Yes, I’ll do it! Here, I want you to go straight to the Assistant Superintendent at Afton.”
“You mean to-night?”
“Right away. I will give you a letter. No, hold on, I’ve got a better plan.”
Again Adair consulted his watch. Bustlingly he hurried through with his preparations for departure. Then he left the house, swung down the street briskly, and, Ralph accompanying him, proceeded to the railroad depot.
He wrote out a long telegram and handed it to the night operator. Then he came back to Ralph.
“See here, Fairbanks,” he remarked. “I’ve42fixed this thing as I want it, and you are one of the few persons I would trust in a matter like this.”
“Thank you for the compliment, Mr. Adair.”
“I know your ability from past experience. It won’t do to neglect following this clew to the silk robbers. I have wired the assistant superintendent for an official request that you be detailed on special duty in my department. Wait here for the reply. Then start out on the trail of those thieves, and report to me day after to-morrow, when I shall return to Stanley Junction.”
“All right,” said Ralph, “I may be able to accomplish something.”
“I think you will, judging from your present success in assisting me,” said Adair.
Ralph had to wait nearly an hour after Adair had left on a special. Then a reply came to the telegram. The operator, as instructed by Adair, handed the message to Ralph. It read:
“Fairbanks, freight fireman, detailed for special work in another department.”
“It’s all right,” said Ralph to himself, as he started homewards. “Now to trace down Ike Slump and the other train robbers.”
43
CHAPTER VIZEPH
The young fireman reported at the roundhouse early in the morning, showing the telegram to Jim Forgan, but not until the foreman had got out of sight and hearing of the other men in the place.
“H’m!” commented Forgan laconically, “I don’t like this.”
“Indeed, Mr. Forgan?” smiled Ralph.
“I don’t, and that’s the truth of it—for two reasons.”
“What are they, Mr. Forgan?”
“First, it interrupts a regular run for you.”
“But I may not be away two days.”
“Next, it gives that Jim Evans a chance to take your place, and I don’t trust the man.”
“Neither do I,” said Ralph pointedly, “and I may have something important to tell you about him when I return.”
Ralph found Zeph industriously chopping kindling wood when he got back home again. The young fireman went into the house, explained his44new employment to his mother, and then called to Zeph.
“You wanted some work, Zeph,” he said to the farmer boy.
“Sure, I do,” cried Zeph with unction.
“Very well, I think I am authorized to offer you a dollar a day.”
“Steady job?” inquired Zeph eagerly.
“No, it may not last, but it is in the railroad service, and may lead to your further employment.”
“Good,” commented Zeph. “What do they want me to do—engineer?”
“Scarcely, Zeph,” said Ralph, smiling. “I simply want you to take me back to the Ames farm and direct me about the locality.”
Zeph looked disappointed.
“Why, what’s that kind of work got to do with railroading?” he said.
“You shall know later.”
“All right. You’re too smart to make any mistakes and too friendly to do anything but good for me, so I’m your man.”
“Very well. First, then, tell me the location of the Ames farm.”
Zeph did this, and Ralph ascertained that it was about five miles west of Brocton.
Ralph secured some money, and in an hour he45and Zeph stepped aboard the cab of a locomotive attached to a load of empties due to run down the line in a few minutes.
They reached Brocton about noon. Ralph proceeded down the tracks towards the railroad cut which had been the scene of the landslide.
He turned off at the wagon road and soon, with his companion, was started westward in the direction of the Ames farm.
“Zeph,” he said, “did you hear anything of a train robbery here the other night?”
No, Zeph had not heard of it. Then Ralph questioned him closely as to the night Ames had loaned his wagon to strangers and gained a few more particulars relating to the silk robbers.
“There is the Ames farm,” reported Zeph at last.
Ralph had already planned out what he would do, and proceeded to instruct his assistant as to his share in the affair.
“Zeph,” he said, “I do not wish to be seen by Ames, nor must he know that you came here with a stranger.”
“Am I to see him?”
“Yes,” answered Ralph, taking a package from under his coat.
“Why, that’s the package I lost!” cried Zeph.
“The same.”46
“And you had it all the time?”
“I did, Zeph, yes. No mystery about it—I simply don’t care to explain to you anything about it till a little later on.”
“All right.”
“I want you to take it and go up to the farmhouse. I will keep out of sight. You go to Ames and tell him it was returned to you, and you want to give it back to the person it belongs to with a message.”
“Whose message?”
“Nobody’s,” answered Ralph, “but you need not say that.”
“What shall I say, then?”
“Tell him you want to advise the person who sent the parcel that it isn’t safe to send such goods to any one at the present time.”
“Very well,” said Zeph. “Suppose Ames tells me where to find the fellow who sent the package?”
“Come back and report to me.”
Zeph started for the farmhouse. Ralph watched him enter it, the package in his hand. He came out in a very few minutes without the parcel.
He was rather glum-faced when he rejoined Ralph.47
“Say,” he observed, “I’ve found out nothing, and old Ames took the package away from me.”
“What did he say?” asked the young fireman.
“He told me he would see that it was returned to the person who sent it.”
“That delays matters,” thought Ralph, “and I don’t know whether Ames will take it back to the silk thieves, or wait for some of them to visit him.”
Then the young fireman formed a sudden resolution. He regarded his companion thoughtfully, and said:
“Zeph, I am going to trust you with what is known as an official secret in the railroad line.”
The farmer boy looked pleased and interested.
“I believe you are too square and friendly to betray that secret.”
“Try me, and see!” cried Zeph with ardor.
“Well,” said Ralph, “there was a silk robbery of the Dover night freight last week, the train I am fireman on. From what you have told me, I feel sure that the thieves hired their rig from Ames. That package you had was part of the stolen plunder. I am acting for the road detective of the Great Northern, and I must locate those robbers.”
“Then,” cried Zeph delightedly, “I am helping you do detective work.”48
“Yes, Zeph, genuine detective work.”
“Oh! how I wish I had my disguises here!”
“You are of more use to me as you are, because the thieves know you worked for Ames, and they seem to trust him.”
“That’s so,” said Zeph thoughtfully. “What you going to do?”
“I want to locate the thieves,” responded Ralph. “You must know the district about here pretty well. Can’t you think of any spot where they would be likely to hide?”
“None in particular. But I know every foot of the woods, swamps and creek. If the men you are looking for are anywhere in the neighborhood, I am sure we will find a trace of them.”
“You pilot the way, then, Zeph. Go with caution if you find any traces of the men, for I am sure that at least two of the party know me.”
For three hours they made a tour of the district, taking in nearly four miles to the south. The swamp lands they could not traverse. Finally they came out of the woods almost directly on a town.
“Why,” said Ralph in some surprise, “here is Millville, the next station to Brocton.”
“That’s so,” nodded Zeph. “I hardly think those fellows are in the woods. We have made a pretty thorough search.”49
“There’s the swamp and the high cliffs we haven’t visited,” said Ralph. “I suppose you are hungry?”
“Moderately,” answered Zeph.
“Then we will go and have something to eat. I have a friend just on the edge of Millville, who keeps a very unique restaurant.”
Ralph smiled pleasantly, for the restaurant in question was quite a feature with railroad men.
Two lines of railroad crossed at Millville, a great deal of switching was done outside of the town, and there was a shanty there to shelter the men.
A little off from the junction was a very queer-looking house, if it could be called such. Its main structure was an old freight car, to which there had been additions made from time to time. Across its front was a sign reading, “Limpy Joe’s Railroad Restaurant.”
“Ever taken a meal here?” inquired Ralph, as they approached the place.
“No.”
“Ever heard of Limpy Joe?”
“Don’t think I have.”
“Then,” said Ralph, “I am going to introduce you to the most interesting boy you ever met.”
50
CHAPTER VIILIMPY JOE’S RAILROAD RESTAURANT
Zeph Dallas stared about him in profound bewilderment and interest as Ralph led the way towards Limpy Joe’s Railroad Restaurant.
It was certainly an odd-appearing place. Additions had been built onto the freight car until the same were longer than the original structure.
A square of about two hundred feet was enclosed by a barbed wire fence, and this space was quite as interesting as the restaurant building.
There was a rude shack, which seemed to answer for a barn, a haystack beside it, and a well-appearing vegetable garden. Then, in one corner of the yard, was a heap of old lumber, stone, brick, doors, window sash, in fact, it looked as if some one had been gathering all the unmated parts of various houses he could find.
The restaurant was neatly painted a regular, dark-red freight-car color outside. Into it many windows had been cut, and a glance through the open doorway showed an interior scrupulously neat and clean.51
“Tell me about it,” said Zeph. “Limpy Joe—who is he? Does he run the place alone?”
“Yes,” answered Ralph. “He is an orphan, and was hurt by the cars a few years ago. The railroad settled with him for two hundred dollars, an old freight car and a free pass for life over the road, including, Limpy Joe stipulated, locomotives and cabooses.”
“Wish I had that,” said Zeph—“I’d be riding all the time.”
“You would soon get tired of it,” Ralph asserted. “Well, Joe invested part of his money in a horse and wagon, located in that old freight car, which the company moved here for him from a wreck in the creek, and became a squatter on that little patch of ground. Then the restaurant idea came along, and the railroad hands encouraged him. Before that, however, Joe had driven all over the country, picking up old lumber and the like, and the result is the place as you see it.”
“Well, he must be an ambitious, industrious fellow.”
“He is,” affirmed Ralph, “and everybody likes him. He’s ready at any time of the night to get up and give a tired-out railroad hand a hot cup of coffee or a lunch. His meals are famous, too, for he is a fine cook.”
“Hello, Ralph Fairbanks,” piped a happy little voice as Ralph and Zeph entered the restaurant.52
Ralph shook hands with the speaker, a boy hobbling about the place on a crutch.
“What’s it going to be?” asked Limpy Joe, “full dinner or a lunch?”
“Both, best you’ve got,” smiled Ralph. “The railroad is paying for this.”
“That so? Then we’ll reduce the rates. Railroad has been too good to me to overcharge the company.”
“This is my friend, Zeph Dallas,” introduced Ralph.
“Glad to know you,” said Joe. “Sit down at the counter, fellows, and I’ll soon have you served.”
“Well, well,” said Zeph, staring around the place one way, then the other, and then repeating the performance. “This strikes me.”
“Interesting to you, is it?” asked Ralph.
“It’s wonderful. Fixed this up all alone out of odds and ends? I tell you, I’d like to be a partner in a business like this.”
“Want a partner here, Joe?” called out Ralph to his friend in a jocular way.
“I want a helper,” answered the cripple, busy among the shining cooking ware on a kitchen stove at one end of the restaurant.
“Mean that?” asked Zeph.
“I do. I have some new plans I want to carry53out, and I need some one to attend to the place half of the time.”
Again Zeph glanced all about the place.
“Say, it fascinates me,” he observed to Ralph. “Upon my word, I believe I’ll come to work here when I get through with this work for you.”
“Tell you what,” said Limpy Joe with a shrewd glance at Zeph, as he placed the smoking dishes before his customers. “I’ll make it worth the while of an honest, active fellow to come in here with me. I have some grand ideas.”
“You had some good ones when you fitted up the place,” declared Zeph.
“You think it over. I like your looks,” continued Joe. “I’m in earnest, and I might make it a partnership after a while.”
The boys ate a hearty meal, and the young fireman paid for it.
“Business good, Joe?” he inquired, as they were about to leave.
“Famous. I’ve got some new customers, too. Don’t know who they are.”
“What’s that?”
“I don’t, for a fact.”
“That sounds puzzling,” observed Ralph.
“Well, it’s considerable of a puzzle to me—all except the double pay I get,” responded Joe. “For54nearly a week I’ve had a funny order. One dark night some one pushed up a window here and threw in a card. It contained instructions and a ten-dollar bill.”
“That’s pretty mysterious,” said the interested Zeph.
“The card told me that if I wanted to continue a good trade, I would say nothing about it, but every night at dark drive to a certain point in the timber yonder with a basket containing a good solid day’s feed for half-a-dozen men.”
“Well, well,” murmured Zeph, while Ralph gave quite a start, but remained silent, though strictly attentive.
“Well, I have acted on orders given, and haven’t said a word about it to anybody but you, Ralph. The reason I tell you is, because I think you are interested in some of the persons who are buying meals from me in this strange way. It’s all right for me to speak out before your friend here?”
“Oh, certainly,” assented Ralph.
“Well, Ike Slump is one of the party in the woods, and Mort Bemis is another.”
“I guessed that the moment you began your story,” said Ralph, “and I am looking for those very persons.”
“I thought you would be interested. They55are wanted for that attempted treasure-train robbery, aren’t they?”
“Yes, and for a more recent occurrence,” answered Ralph—“the looting of the Dover freight the other night.”
“I never thought of that, though I should have done so,” said Joe. “The way I know that Slump and Bemis are in the woods yonder, is that one night I had a breakdown, and was delayed a little, and saw them come for the food basket where I had left it.”
Ralph’s mind was soon made up. He told Joe all about their plans.
“You’ve got to help us out, Joe,” he added.
“You mean take you up into the woods in the wagon to-night?”
“Yes.”
“Say,” said Joe, his shrewd eyes sparkling with excitement, “I’ll do it in fine style. Ask no questions. I’ve got a plan. I’ll have another breakdown, not a sham one, this time. I’ll have you two well covered up in the wagon box, and you can lie there until some one comes after the basket.”
“Good,” approved Ralph, “you are a genuine friend, Joe.”
Ralph and Zeph had to wait around the restaurant all the afternoon. There was only an56occasional customer, and Joe had plenty of time to spare. He took a rare delight in showing his friends his treasures, as he called them.
About dusk Joe got the food supply ready for the party in the woods. He hitched up the horse to a wagon, arranged some blankets and hay in the bottom of the vehicle, so that his friends could hide themselves, and soon all was ready for the drive into the timber.
Ralph managed to look out as they proceeded into the woods. The wagon was driven about a mile. Then Joe got out and set the basket under a tree.
A little distance from it he got out again, took off a wheel, left it lying on the ground, unhitched the horse, and rode away on the back of the animal. The vehicle, to a casual observer, would suggest the appearance of a genuine breakdown.
“Now, Zeph,” said Ralph as both arranged their coverings so they could view tree and basket clearly, “no rash moves.”
“If anybody comes, what then?” inquired the farmer boy.
“We shall follow them, but with great caution. Keep close to me, so that I can give you special instructions, if it becomes necessary.”
“Good,” said Zeph. “That will be soon, for there they are!”57
Two figures had appeared at the tree. One took up the basket, the other glanced around stealthily. Ralph recognized both of them, even in the dim twilight, at some distance away. One was Ike Slump, the other his old-time crony and accomplice, Mort Bemis.
58
CHAPTER VIIITHE HIDDEN PLUNDER
“That’s the fellow who brought the package of silk to old Ames,” whispered Zeph, staring hard from under covert at Slump.
“Yes, I recognize him,” responded Ralph in quite as guarded a tone. “Quiet, now, Zeph.”
Ike Slump and Mort Bemis continued to linger at the tree. They were looking at the wagon and beyond it.
“Say,” spoke the former to his companion, “what’s wrong?”
“How wrong?” inquired Mort.
“Why, some way our plans appear to have slipped a cog. There’s the wagon broken down and the boy has gone with the horse. Two of our men were to stop him, you know, and keep him here while we used the wagon.”
“Maybe they’re behind time. What’s the matter with our holding the boy till they come?”
“The very thing,” responded Ike, and, leaving59the basket where it was, he and Mort ran after Limpy Joe and the horse.
“Get out of here, quick,” ordered Ralph to Zeph. “If we don’t, we shall probably be carried into the camp of the enemy.”
“Isn’t that just exactly the place that you want to reach?” inquired the farmer boy coolly.
“Not in this way. Out with you, and into the bushes. Don’t delay, Zeph, drop flat, some one else is coming.”
It was a wonder they were not discovered, for almost immediately two men came running towards the spot. They were doubtless the persons Ike Slump had referred to, for they gave a series of signal whistles, responded to by their youthful accomplices, who, a minute later, came into view leading the horse of which Limpy Joe was astride.
“We were late,” panted one of the men.
“Should think you were,” retorted Ike Slump. “This boy nearly got away. Say, if you wasn’t a cripple,” he continued to the young restaurant keeper, “I’d give you something for whacking me with that crutch of yours.”
“I’d whack you again, if it would do any good,” said the plucky fellow. “You’re a nice crowd, you are, bothering me this way after I’ve probably saved you from starvation the last week.”
“That’s all right, sonny,” drawled out one of60the men. “We paid you for what you’ve done for us, and we will pay you still better for simply coming to our camp and staying there a prisoner, until we use that rig of yours for a few hours.”
“If you wanted to borrow the rig, why didn’t you do so in a decent fashion?” demanded Joe indignantly.
“You keep quiet, now,” advised the man who carried on the conversation. “We know our business. Here, Slump, you and Mort help get this wheel on the wagon and hitch up the horse.”
They forced Joe into the wagon bottom and proceeded to get ready for a drive into the woods.
“Bet Joe is wondering how we came to get out of that wagon,” observed Zeph to Ralph.
“Don’t talk,” said Ralph. “Now, when they start away, I will follow, you remain here.”
“Right here?”
“Yes, so that I may find you when I come back, and so that you can follow the wagon when it comes out of the woods again if I am not on hand.”
“You think they are going to move some of their plunder in the wagon?”
“Exactly,” replied the young fireman.
“Well, so do I. They won’t get far with it, though, if I am after them,” boasted Zeph. “Wish I had a detective star and some weapons.”61
“The safest way to do is to follow them until they get near a town or settlement, and then go for assistance and arrest them,” advised Ralph. “Now, then, Zeph, make no false moves.”
“No, I will follow your orders strictly,” pledged the farmer boy.
The basket was lifted into the wagon by Ike, who, with Mort, led the horse through the intricate timber and brushwood. Progress was difficult and they proceeded slowly. As soon as it was safe to do so, Ralph left Zeph. The two men had taken up the trail of the wagon, guarding its rear so that Joe could not escape.
Ralph kept sight of them for half-an-hour and was led deeper and deeper into the woods. These lined the railroad cut, and he wondered that the gang of robbers had dared to camp so near to the recent scene of their thieving operations.
At last the young fireman was following only two men, for he could no longer see the wagon.
“Perhaps they have left Ike and Bemis to go ahead with the wagon and they are reaching the camp by a short cut,” reflected Ralph. “Why, no,” he suddenly exclaimed, as the men turned aside to take a new path. “These are not the same men at all who were with the wagon. I am off the trail, I am following some one else.”
Ralph made this discovery with some surprise.62Certainly he had got mixed up in cautiously trailing the enemy at a distance. He wondered if the two men he was now following belonged to Ike Slump’s crowd.
“I must assume they do,” ruminated Ralph, “at least for the present. They are bound for some point in the woods, of course, and I shall soon know their destination.”
The two men proceeded for over a mile. They commenced an ascent where the cliffs lining the railroad cut began. The place was thick with underbrush and quite rocky in places, wild and desolate in the extreme, and the path they pursued so tortuous and winding that Ralph at length lost sight of them.
“Where have they disappeared to?” he asked himself, bending his ear, keeping a sharp lookout, and with difficulty penetrating the worst jungle of bushes and stunted trees he had yet encountered. “I hear voices.”
These guided Ralph, and he followed their indication. At last he came to a halt near an open space, where the men he was following had stopped.
“Here we are, Ames,” were the first distinct words that Ralph heard spoken.
“Why, one of these men must be the farmer that Zeph worked for,” decided Ralph.63
“All right, you’re safe enough up here. Got the plunder here, have you?” was asked.
“Yes. I will show you the exact spot, and you come here after we have got the bulk of the stuff to a new hiding place, take it as you can, dispose of it, and keep us in ready money until we feel safe to ship our goods to some distant city and realize on them.”
“I’ll do just that,” was replied. “What are you leaving here for?”
“Adair, the road detective, is after us, we understand, and this is too dangerously near the railroad.”
“That’s so,” replied the person Ralph supposed to be Ames. “All right, I’ll not miss on my end of the case. Only, don’t send any more packages of the silk to friends. The one Slump sent might have got you into trouble.”
“I never knew he did it at the time,” was responded. “I raised a big row when I found out. You see, Evans, the man he sent it to, is in with us in a way, and is a particular friend of Ike Slump, but it was a big risk to send him goods that might be traced right back to us. Safe hiding place, eh?”
The speaker had proceeded to some bushes guarding the entrance to a cave-like depression in the dirt, gravel and rocks. He re-appeared with64some packages for his companion. Then both went away from the spot.
“Why,” said Ralph, with considerable satisfaction, “this is the hiding place of the plunder. I am in possession, and what am I going to do about it?”
The discovery had come about so easily that the young fireman could scarcely plan out a next intelligent move all in a moment.
“Ames is an accomplice of the thieves,” he decided, “who are going to use Joe’s wagon to remove the bulk of this plunder. They will soon be here. What had I better do—what can I do?”
Ralph went in among the bushes as the men had done. He took a glance at a great heap of packages lying in a depression in the rocks. Then he advanced a few steps towards the edge of the cliff.
Ralph looked down fully two hundred feet into the railroad cut. This was almost the spot where the landslide had stopped the Dover night freight. The main tracks were clear now, but on a gravel pit siding were several cars.
“Why,” exclaimed Ralph suddenly, “if I only have the time to do it in, I have got the whole affair right in my own hands.”
A plan to deprive the railroad thieves of their booty had come into the mind of the young fireman.65Ralph filled his arms with the packages of silk, advanced to the edge of the cliff, threw them over, and continued his operation until he had removed the last parcel from its hiding place.
“Something more to do yet,” he told himself, when this task was completed. “When the thieves discover that their plunder is gone, they may surmise that it disappeared this way. Can I make a safe descent?”
Ralph had a hard time getting down into the railroad cut. Once there, he hastily threw the silk packages into a half-filled gravel car, with a shovel covered them all over with sand and gravel, and then started on a run for Brocton.