Part 30 (1/2)

He waited on the bank long enough for the water to drip off from him, and getting his breath, started to regain the railroad tracks.

When he came to a little station he found it closed for the night, but he knew that the agent must live in some one of the few houses in the settlement. He might locate him and induce him to come to the station and telegraph to Stanley Junction. With the aid of a signal lantern, however, Ralph was able to see the clock in the station. It was a few minutes after ten o'clock.

”There's a train reaches the Junction at eleven twenty-five,” he reflected. ”By hustling I can catch it at Acton. I can tell more and do more personally in five minutes than I can in five hours by wiring.”

Ralph reached Acton some minutes before the West train came in. He had some change in his pocket, paid his fare to the Junction, and went out on the rear platform as they neared the destination.

He left the train a mile from the depot, swinging off at a point that would enable him to reach the roundhouse foreman's house by a short cut.

Ralph found the place closed up. There was a light in one upper room, however, and he had only to knock twice when Forgan came to the door in his s.h.i.+rt-sleeves.

”Is it you, Fairbanks?” he said, in some surprise.

”Yes, sir, and--special!”

”Why, what have you been into?” exclaimed Forgan, catching a glimpse of Ralph's bedraggled form and disfigured head.

”I have been in a freight car for one thing, and in the river for another,” said Ralph. ”There is no time to lose, Mr. Forgan, if you want to get back those stolen fittings.”

”You know where they are?”

”I know where they were at eight o'clock,” responded Ralph, ”but I know they won't be there much after midnight.

”Good--wait a minute,” directed Forgan.

He hurried back into the house and returned drawing on his coat. ”I was just going to bed,” he explained. ”Now, then, Fairbanks,” as he led the way to the street. ”Tell your story--quick.”

Ralph recited his experience of the past four hours, and Forgan hastened his steps as the narration developed the necessity of sharp, urgent action.

”Fairbanks, you are a trump!” commended Forgan, as the story was all told. ”I'll leave you here. You get home, into dry clothes, and have your hurt attended to. You had better take the sick-list benefits for a day or two. Good-night--till I have something more definite to say to you.”

A dismissal did not suit Ralph at all. It looked like crowding him out of an exciting and interesting game only half-finished.

”I might help you some further,” he began, but Forgan interrupted him with the words:

”You've done the real work, Fairbanks, and neither of us will care to muddle in with the details of arrest. I shall put the matter directly in the hands of the road detective, Matthewson. I am sorry for his father's sake if Ike Slump gets caught in the net, but he deserves it fully, and I can't stop to risk the interests of the railway company.”

Ralph went home. As he expected, his mother was waiting up for him. She was not the kind of a woman to faint or get hysterical at the sight of a little blood, but she was anxious and trembling as she helped Ralph to get into comfortable trim.

”Don't worry, mother,” said Ralph. ”This is probably the end of trouble with the Ike Slump complication.”

”I always fear an enemy, Ralph,” sighed the widow. ”It seems as if you are fated to have them at every step. I keep thinking day and night about Gasper Farrington's unmanly threat.”

”Mother,” said Ralph earnestly, ”I am trying to do right, am I not?”

”Oh, Ralph--never a boy better!”

”Thank you, mother, that is sweet praise, and worth going through the experience that will make a man of me. Well, I am going to keep right on doing my duty the best way I know how. I expect ups and downs. Men like Farrington may succeed for a time, but in the end I believe I shall come out just right.”