"Both closed up by this time," ruminated Bart. "We can't deliver to-night. Anything very urgent among that stuff, Darry?"

"Nothing," replied his young assistant.

"You can go home, then," directed Bart. "Pretty tired, eh? A big day's work, this."

"Say, Bart," spoke up Darry, as he dallied at the door, "who was the fellow that bought that last package?"

"A friend of mine, Darry," answered Bart seriously. "And I am worried about him. He is the man I told you about who helped me save my father the night of the fire."

"He acted very queerly. And Lem Wacker, too," added Darry thoughtfully. "Is something new up, Bart? The way Wacker carried on, he seemed to have some idea in his head."

"He had the idea he could bulldoze me," said Bart bluntly, "and found he couldn't. What bothers me is, why were both of them so anxious to get this package?"

Bart took it out of his pocket as he spoke, nodded good night to Darry, and sat down on a bench, turning the parcel over and over in his hand.

"A.A. Adams," he read from the tag, "a queer name, and no one answering to it here in Pleasantville. I wonder why Baker was so excited when he heard that name? I wonder why Lem Wacker bid it up? Is he aware of the mystery surrounding Baker? Has this package got something to do with it? Wacker looked as though he had struck a prosperous streak, and bragged recklessly about the lot of money he could get. I must find Baker. He was in no condition, mentally or physically, to wander about at random."

The package in question, Bart decided, held papers. It had been given him in trust, and he could not open it without Baker's permission. He replaced it in his pocket and went forth.

Bart visited all of Baker's old familiar haunts in the freight yards, but found no trace of him. Then he called at the Sharp Corner. Its proprietor claimed that Lem Wacker had not been there since noon.

Bart spoke to two of the yards night watchmen. He described Baker, and requested them to speak to him if they ran across him, and to tell him that Bart Stirling was very anxious to see him up at his house.

Affairs at the little express office had settled down to routine when, one morning, Darry Haven dropped into the place.

He found Bart engrossed in reading a letter very carefully. Its envelope lay on the desk. Glancing at it casually, Darry saw that it was from express headquarters.

"Anything wrong?" he inquired, as Bart folded up the letter and placed it in his pocket.

"Not with me, anyway," replied Bart with a smile. "There is something wrong at Cardysville, a hundred miles or so down the main line," he went on.

"And how does that interest you, Bart?"

"Why, it seems I have got to go down there on some business for the Company."

"To-day?"

"The sooner the better, that letter says. It is from the inspector. It is quite flattering to me, for he starts out with complimenting the excellent business system this office has always sustained."

"H'm!" chuckled Darry—"any mention of your valued extra help?"

"No, but that may come along, for you have got to represent me here again to-day, and possibly to-morrow."

"Is that so?" said Darry. "Well, I guess I can arrange."

"You see," explained Bart, "the letter is a sort of confidential one. Reading between the lines, I assume that a certain Peter Pope, now express agent at Cardysville, and evidently recently appointed, is a relative of one of the officials of the company. Anyway, he has been running—or not running—things for a week. The inspector writes that the man has very little to do, for it is a small station, but that very little he appears to do very badly."

"How, Bart?"

"His reports and returns are all mixed up. He doesn't have the least idea of how to run things intelligently. The inspector asks me to go and see him, take some of our blanks, open a set of books for him, and try and install a system that will bring things around clearer."

"Why, Bart," exclaimed Darry, "they have promoted you!"

"I don't see it, Darry."

"That's traveling auditor's work. Besides, a delicate and confidential mission for an official. Wake up! you've struck a higher rung on the ladder, and I'll wager they'll boost you fast."

"Nonsense, Darry, I happen to be handy and accommodating, and they don't want to turn the fellow down on account of his 'pull.' Maybe they think the offer and suggestions of a boy will have a result where a regular official visit would offend Mr. Peter Pope's backer—see?"

All the same, Bart felt very much pleased over this unexpected communication. He blessed his lucky stars that he had such a bright and dependable substitute at hand as Darry Haven.

The latter soon made his school and home arrangements, and Bart left affairs in his hands about ten o'clock, catching the train west after getting a pass for the Cardysville round trip.

It was two o'clock when the train arrived at Bart's destination. He found Cardysville to be a place of about 2,000 inhabitants. Most of the town, however, lay half-a-mile away from the B. & M. Railroad, another line cutting in farther north.

Bart noticed crowds of people and a circus tent in the distance. The express shed was a gloomy little den of a place on a spur track. Near the depot was a small lunch counter. Bart got something to eat, and strolled down the tracks.

As he drew near to the express shed, Bart noticed an old armchair out on its platform.

A very stout man in his shirt sleeves sat in this, smoking a pipe.

He got up and waddled around restlessly. Bart noticed that he approached the door of the express office on tiptoe. He acted scared, for, bending his ear to listen, he retreated precipitately. Then he stood stock-still, staring stupidly at the building.

He gave a nervous start as Bart came up behind him—quite a jump, in fact. Bart, studying his flabby, uneasy face, wondered what was the matter with the man.

"Hello!" jerked out the Cardysville express agent. "Sort of startled me."

"Are you Mr. Pope?" inquired Bart.

"Yes, that's me," assented the other. "Stranger here? looking for me?"

"I am," answered Bart. "My name is Stirling. I work at the express office at Pleasantville."

"Oh, yes, I've heard of you," said Peter Pope. "The express inspector wrote me about you. He said you was a young kid, sort of green in the business, who might drop in on me to get some points on the business."

"Quite so," nodded Bart with a side smile, "catching on," as the phrase goes, and at once falling in with the way the inspector was working matters. "We can't learn too much about the express business, you know, and I thought that by comparing notes with you we might dig out something of mutual benefit."

"You bet!" responded Pope, perking up quite grandly. "The Vice-President of the express company is my cousin. I've got a big pull. Soon as I get the ropes learned, I'm going for a manager's job in the city."

"That will be quite fine," said Bart. "I brought some books and blanks with me, and, if you can spare the time, I would like to have you see how our system strikes you."

"Sure. Come in—no, that is, I'll bring out a chair. I keep only one record. I've got this business simplified down to a lead pencil and a scratch book, see?"

Bart did "see," and knew that the express inspector had "seen," also. He wondered why Pope did not take him into the office. He marveled still more as, watching Pope, he noticed he hesitated at the door of the express shed. Then Pope moved forward as if actually unwilling to enter the place.

Half a minute after he had disappeared within the shed, Pope came rushing out, pale and flustered. He tumbled over the chair he was bringing to Bart, and a book he carried went flying from under his arm into the dirt of the road beyond the platform.

"Why," exclaimed Bart, in some surprise, "what is the matter, Mr. Pope?"

"Matter!" gasped Pope, his eyes rolling, as he backed away from the doorway, "say, that place is haunted!"

"What place?"

"The express room. I've been worried for an hour. It's nigh tuckered me out."

"What has?" inquired Bart

"Groans, hisses, rustlings. I thought a while back that someone was hiding in among the express stuff, and trying to scare me. 'Taint so, though. I went among it, and there's no place for anybody to hide."

"Oh, pshaw!" said Bart reassuringly, "you are only nervous, Mr. Pope. It's some live freight, likely. Can I take a look?"

"Sure—wish you would. I've been posting up on express business, you see, maybe that's the matter. Read about fellows hiding in boxes, and jumping out and murdering the messenger. Read about enemies sending a man exploding bombs, and blowing him to pieces."

"Nonsense, Mr. Pope!" said Bart, "you don't look as if you had an enemy in the world."

"I haven't," declared Peter Pope, "but every business man has his rivals, of course. I've heard that those city chaps have an eye on any fellow that makes a record like I'm making here. They don't want to see him get ahead. They must guess that I'm in line for a big promotion, and that might worry them into playing some tragical trick on me."

Bart wanted to laugh outright. He kept a straight face, and solemnly started to investigate the trouble. He stepped into the express room and took a keen look around, Pope timorously following him.

"There!" panted Pope suddenly, "what did I tell you?"

"That's so," said Bart. "It is sort of mysterious. Someone groaned, sure. What have you here, anyway?"

Bart went over to a heap of express matter, come in just that morning. There were several small crates, a box or two, and a very large trunk. Bart centered his attention on this latter. He stooped down as his quick eye observed a row of holes at one end, just under the hauling strap.

"Quiet, for a minute," he whispered warningly to Pope, who, big-eyed and trembling, resembled a man on the threshold of some most appalling discovery.

Bart's strained hearing shortly caught a rustling sound. It was followed by a kind of choking moan. Unmistakably, he decided, both came from the trunk.

"Is it locked? No," he said, examining the front of the trunk. Then Bart snapped back its two catches. He seized the cover and threw it back.

"Gracious!" gasped Peter Pope.

Bart himself was a trifle startled.

As the trunk cover lifted, a man stepped out.



CHAPTER XXVI

ON THE MIDNIGHT EXPRESS

"Air—and water!" panted the mysterious occupant of the trunk.

Bart looked him over in some wonder. He was a short, wiry man, and arrayed in a close-fitting costume resembling that of the circus athlete on duty.

The man was drenched with perspiration and so nearly exhausted with his suffocating imprisonment, that his voice was rasping and hollow.

He was weak, too. As he stepped over the side of the trunk he staggered feebly. Then, making out an open window and a pail of drinking water on a bench near it, he made a swift dive in that direction.

First the man stuck his head out of the window and drew in great draughts of pure, fresh air.

Then he seized the tin cup near the pail. He dipped up the water and drank cupful after cupful until Bart eyed him in some alarm.

"Ah—h!" breathed the man in a long aspiration of relief and enjoyment, "that's better. Say, ten minutes more and there would have been no Professor Rigoletto."

As he spoke he went back to the trunk. He took out a long gossamer rain coat that had been used as a pillow. This he proceeded to put on.

It came to his feet. He buttoned it up, drew a jaunty crush cap from one of its pockets, and grinned pleasantly into the face of the petrified Peter Pope.

"See here!" blurted out the Cardysville express agent, "this isn't—isn't regular. It isn't schedule, you know."

"I hope not—sincerely," airily retorted the stranger. "Fifty miles on a slow train, three hours waiting in a close trunk. Ah, no. But I've arrived. Ha, ha, that's so!"

He glanced into the trunk. Its bottom seemed covered with some coarse burlap. Professor Rigoletto threw shut the cover.

"Aha!" he said suddenly, bending his ear as a strain of distant circus music floated on the air. "Show on, I'll be late. I'll call later—"

"No, you don't!" interrupted Pope, recovering from his fright, and placing his bulky form in the doorway.

"Don't what, my friend?" mildly asked the Professor.

"Deadhead—beat the express company. You're one trunk—and excess weight."

"I don't dispute it. What, then?"

"Pay," promptly and definitely announced the agent.

"Can't. Haven't a cent. That's why I had to get a friend to ship me this way. But he said he'd wire ahead to my partner with the circus, who would call for me here. I'll go and find him, and settle the bill."

"You don't leave here until those charges are paid. You want to be rapid, too," declared Pope, "or I'll see if the railroad company don't want to collect fare, as well."

"Want to keep me here, eh?" murmured the Professor thoughtfully. "Well, I'm agreeable, only you'll have to feed and bed me. If I'm live stock, I demand live-stock privileges, see?"

The express agent looked worried.

"What am I to do?" he asked, in a quandary, of Bart.

"Oh," smiled Bart, "I guess you had better trust him to find his friend and come back with the money."

"I'll hold the trunk, anyway," observed Pope. "What have you got in it? Some old worthless togs, I suppose."

"Mistake—about a thousand dollars in value," coolly retorted the Professor.

"Yes, you have! I thought so. Some old burlap."

"Careful, my friend!" spoke the deadhead sharply. "There's nothing there that you will care to see."

"Isn't there? I'll investigate, just the same," declared Pope, throwing back the trunk cover and delving in the heap of burlap. "Murder! Help!"

Peter Pope uttered a fearful yell. He backed from the trunk suddenly, A sinuous, hissing form had risen up before his face.

This was an enormous cobra, and, under the circumstances, very frightful to see. The Cardysville express agent made a headlong bolt for the door. He slid clear outside across the platform, and landed in the mud of the road.

"Prt! prt! Caesar, so—so!" spoke Professor Rigoletto in a peculiar, purring tone, approaching the serpent.

He coaxed and forced the big snake back into its warm coverings, and shut down the trunk cover and clasped it. Bart, highly edified at the unique incident, followed him outside.

"I'm the Cingalese snake-charmer," explained Professor Rigoletto. "Sorry, my friend," he observed to the wry-faced Pope, who was busy scraping the mud from his clothing, "but I told you so."

"Ugh!" shuddered the agent. "You get that trunk out of here double-quick, or I'll have you arrested."

"Sure, I will," answered the Professor with alacrity, "and I promise you that I will bring or send you the express charges by the time the show is over."

Professor Rigoletto dragged the trunk to the platform. It was not a heavy burden, now. Bart good-humoredly assisted him in getting it balanced properly on his shoulder. The professor courteously thanked him and asked him to come and see the show free, and marched off quite contented with the result of his daring deadhead experiment.

The Cardysville express agent was greatly worked up over the incident of the hour. It was some time before he could get his mind sufficiently calmed down to discuss business affairs coherently.

Bart, however, handled the man in a pleasant, politic manner, and soon had results working.

He let Peter Pope imagine that he was the originator of every idea that he, Bart himself, suggested. He very deftly introduced the system in vogue at the Pleasantville express office.

In fact, at the end of two hours Bart had accomplished all he had been sent to do. He had got Pope's records into sensible shape, had opened a small set of books for him, and knew that the inspector must be pleased with the results.

Bart had missed the early afternoon train. There was no other running to Pleasantville direct until eleven o'clock that night.

He had planned to put in the time strolling about town, when Professor Rigoletto appeared. He was accompanied by a friend.

The latter ascertained the express charges on the trunk, paid them, and handed both Bart and Pope a free ticket to the evening's entertainment.

Bart took a stroll by himself, got his supper at a neat little restaurant, and met Pope as agreed at the door of the main show tent at seven o'clock.

They were given good seats, and they had the pleasure of seeing Professor Rigoletto and his big snake under more agreeable conditions than those of their first introduction to them.

The show was a very good one, and at half-past ten they left the tent. The Cardysville express agent accompanied Bart to the depot, where the east bound train was due to arrive in thirty minutes.

As they walked up and down the platform, a horse and wagon drove up to the little express shed. Pope went over to it. Bart accompanied him.

The driver of the wagon was a brisk, smart-looking farmery individual. Pope knew him, and nodded to him in a friendly fashion.

"Come after something?" inquired the agent "I don't recall that there is anything here for you."

"No, I want to express these hives," answered the farmer.

He indicated six boxes lying in his wagon, covered with gauze.

"Bother!" said Pope, a little crossly. "That's no midnight job. Why don't you come in the daytime, Mr. Simms? You just caught me here by chance, at this outlandish hour."

"Particular shipment," explained Simms, "and I've got to catch the trains just right. You see, these are special imported Italian bees, Breeders. I reckon every one of those beauties is worth half-a-dollar. They're very delicate in this climate, and call for great care. I want you to instruct the messenger to follow the directions carded on the boxes."

"I can do that," said Pope. "What he will do, is another thing."

"You see," continued the farmer, "if they handle them carefully at Pleasantville, and see that they catch the early express to the city from there, someone will be waiting to take them in charge at the terminus. I'd be awful glad to tip the messenger handsomely to have someone at Pleasantville, where they transfer the hives, open the ventilators for a spell and tip down into the pans some of the honey syrup."

"I will do that for you, sir," spoke up Bart—"I am in charge of the express office at Pleasantville. I am going on this train, and I will be glad to see that your goods are attended to just right, and transferred on time."

"Say, will you?" exclaimed the farmer in a pleased tone. "Now, that's just the ticket! The wrong draught on those bees, or too much bad air, or too little feed, and they die off in dozens. You see, at fifty cents apiece, that means quite a loss on an unlucky shipment."

"It does, indeed, Mr. Simms," responded Bart "I am very much interested in the little workers, and you can rest easy as to their being rightly cared for. I believe I will ride to Pleasantville in the express car, so your bees will be right under my eye till they are put on the city express."

"Thank you, thank you," said the farmer heartily.

As the train whistled in the distance, he came up to Bart and slipped a bank note in his hand.

Bart demurred, but it was no use. He found himself two dollars richer for his accommodating proposition.

As the train drew up, Peter Pope rapped at the door of the express car. A sleepy-eyed messenger opened it. The hives were shoved in. Bart made a brief explanation to the messenger, showing his pass. He waved a pleasant adieu to Pope and the farmer as the express car door was closed and locked.

When Bart got home he was more than tired out. But he had done well and in the end got full praise for his work.

A day passed, and Bart failed to find Baker. He hunted everywhere and kept up the search until he knew not where to look further.

Bart went home. He had scarcely reached his bedroom when there was a vigorous summons at the front door.

"I hope it is Baker," murmured Bart, as he slipped on the coat he had just taken off.

"A telegram, Bart," said his mother, at the bottom of the stairs.

She had receipted for it. Bart tore it open wonderingly, glancing first at the signature, and marveling at its unusual length. It was signed by Robert Leslie, superintendent of the express company, at the city end of the line.

This is what it said:

"Special II. 256 by afternoon express, for Martin & Company, Pleasantville, contains fifteen thousand dollars in cash, sender Dunn & Son, Importers. They ask me to make a special delivery, and will defray any extra cost for having it accepted personally by A.B. Martin, and receipted for by him in the presence of witnesses. Delivery to be legal, must be made before twelve, midnight, and this certified to. This is a very important matter for one of the company's largest customers. Be sure to make delivery on time."

Bart read the telegram over twice, taking in its important details, with a serious face.

"Fifteen thousand dollars!" he repeated. "It has saved me some worry that I did not discover the amount before. As to the delivery, that is easy. I've got over two hours yet. I see what it is. Martin & Company probably want to throw up a contract because prices have gone up, the contract must be made binding by payment of fifteen thousand dollars by midnight, or Dunn & Son lose. All right."

His mother noticed that some important business was on her son's mind, and only told Bart to take care of himself.

Bart hurried towards the express office. At a street crossing he paused, to let pass a close carriage that was driven along at a furious rate of speed in the direction from which he had just come.

"Hello!" he forcibly ejaculated, as it flashed by him, the corner street lamp irradiating its interior brightly—"there's queer company for you!"

The remark was warranted. The occupants of the vehicle were Colonel Jeptha Harrington and Lem Wacker.



CHAPTER XXVII

LATE VISITORS

The little express office was dark and lonely-looking when Bart again reached it.

Bart unlocked the office door, shot the inside bolt carefully after him, lighted the lantern, placed it on the desk, and opened the safe.

As he selected the big brown envelope marked "Martin & Company," and bearing the express company's shining green seals, his fingers tingled. The immensity of the sum intrusted to his charge perturbed him a trifle.

Bart relocked the safe, stowed the envelope in an inner pocket, and opened the drawer of a little stand leaning against the safe.

He took out a revolver. Mr. Leslie himself had advised him to always have one handy in the express office. Bart had never touched the weapon before. It had been loaned him by Mr. Haven, and Darry had brought it to the office. Bart slipped it now into a side pocket.

He noticed in detail the entry on the messenger's slip. The prepaid charges on the Martin & Company consignment were seven dollars and seventy-five cents, or five cents for every hundred dollars or fraction of it over the first fifty dollars, which was charged for at regular tariff rates, twenty-five cents.

"It is fifteen thousand dollars, right enough!" mused Bart. "Now, to make sure of the form of receipt."

He filled out a special receipt that acknowledged besides the usual delivery, a verification of the amount of the inclosure, its acceptance as correct, and left a blank for the names of two witnesses.

Bart was now ready to sally forth on his peculiar errand, and had fully decided in his mind the persons he would get to act as his witnesses.

"What is that!" he questioned, suddenly and sharply.

He could hear a springy vehicle bound over the near tracks, and then its wheels cut the loose cindered road leading up to the express office.

It halted. He could catch the quick, labored breathing of two horses, a carriage door creaked! some low voices made a brief hum of conversation, and the vehicle seemed to depart.

Bart stood stock-still, wondering and guessing. Footsteps sounded on the platform. There came a thundering thump as of a heavy cane on the office door.

"Who is there?" demanded Bart.

"Colonel Harrington. I've got to see you."

"Come in," Bart said, unbolting the door.

Colonel Harrington was red of face and fussy of manner. He threw the door shut with his foot, and sank to a bench, breathing heavily.

"Was there something you wanted to say to me, Colonel Harrington?" inquired Bart.

"Yes there was!" snapped out the rich man of Pleasantville. "Anxious to see you! Just drove up to your house. They told me you were here. I once offered you a hundred dollars."

Bart nodded, with a faint smile.

"It wasn't enough," stumbled on the colonel. "I am now going to make it a thousand."

"Why, what for, Colonel Harrington?" demanded Bart in surprise.

"Because you can earn it."

"How?"

"Shall I be blunt and plain?"

"It is always the best way."

"Very well, then," resumed the colonel desperately. "A certain unclaimed express package was sold here to-day, marked A.A. Adams. You've got it."

"How do you know that?"

"Oh, you know it and I want it. Hand it over, and here"—the colonel made a dive for his pocketbook—"here's your thousand dollars."

Bart made a signal of remonstrance with his hand, his face grave and decided.

"Stop right there, Colonel Harrington," he said forcibly. "Are you aware that you are offering a bribe to a bonded representative of the express company?"

"Rot take your express company!" growled the colonel angrily. "I am one of its stock-holders. I could buy the whole concern out, if I wanted to!"

"Until you do, I obey official instructions," announced Bart. "Please do not degrade yourself and embarrass me, Colonel Harrington, by saying anything further on this score. I will not sell my honor, nor swerve a hair's breadth from a line of duty plain and clear. The package you refer to was legally purchased by the highest bidder, I hold it temporarily in trust for him. It is as safe and sacred with me as if it was the property of the First National Bank of Pleasantville."

Colonel Harrington squirmed, got red and pale by turns, gripped his cane fiercely, and then, relaxed with a groan.

"It's my property!" he declared. "I can prove it's my property."

"Then I suggest that you persuade the person who bought it of that fact," said Bart.

"Say!" shot out the colonel eagerly, his eye brightening, "if I bring an order from that same person, will you give up the package?"

Bart hesitated.

"You know where he is, then?" he inquired suspiciously.

"I—I might find him," stammered the military man.

"I do not think I would," said Bart. "Bring him here personally, and I will hand it over to him—in your presence, if he says so."

The colonel groaned again. It was plainly to be seen that he was in an intense inward frenzy.

"Stirling, you've got to give me that package!" he cried, springing to his feet and lifting his cane threateningly.

"Have I?" said Bart, facing him watchingly.

"Be careful, Colonel Harrington! you are pretty near committing a criminal offense."

"You're in the plot—you know all about it! Give up that package, or—or—"

"Colonel Harrington," said Bart calmly, but every word ringing out as clear as the tone of a bell, "I am no ruffian, and I hate violence, but if you lift that cane to me again—I'll shoot."

Bart showed the gleaming top of the weapon in his pocket, backing to the door.

Just then the door behind him was forcibly thrust open, its edge hitting him violently. Then someone pounced upon him.

The attack was sudden and effective. A piece of rope was looped deftly about Bart's arms, holding him helpless, secured behind, and as he was pushed roughly against the desk. Lem Wacker's evil face leered down upon him.

"Don't you holler!" ordered Lem.

As he spoke, he leaned over the railing. The waste box held a mass of cotton that had packed some of the parcels disposed of at the sale that afternoon. Lem grabbed up a handful, and forcibly stuffed it into Bart's mouth.

"Wacker! Wacker!" gasped Colonel Harrington in affright, "don't—don't hurt him. This is dreadful—"

"Shut up!" ordered Lem Wacker recklessly, "you want something and don't know how to get it. I do—and will."

He snatched at Bart's tightly-buttoned coat and tore it loose, groped inside and drew out a package.

"I've got it," he announced. "No!—he ripped off the end of the parcel—here's a haul."

Bart writhed, choked on the loose strangling filaments of cotton, but could not utter a word.

"Give me that package!" cried the colonel. "Stop! where are you going?"

Lem Wacker had bolted. The colonel stared in marveling astonishment as his cohort sprang through the open doorway. Bart had managed to wad the cotton in his mouth into a compact wet mass, enabling him to speak.

"Colonel Harrington!" he cried, "that man has not got the package you were after. He has instead stolen a money envelope for Martin & Company containing fifteen thousand dollars in currency, and is making off with it. Cut this rope instantly that I may pursue him, or I give you my word that, as a partner in his crime, rich as you are, and influential as you are, you shall go to the State penitentiary."



CHAPTER XXVIII

THIRTY SECONDS OF TWELVE

It was an exciting moment. Bart was intently worked up, but he kept his head level. Everything hung on the action of the next two minutes.

Whatever price the rich Colonel Harrington was paying Lem Wacker for his cooeperation, it was not enough to blind that individual to a realization of the fact that accident had placed in Wacker's grasp the great haul of his life, and he was making off with this fortune, leaving the colonel in the lurch.

The latter stood shaking like an aspen, his face the color of chalk. Apparently he took in and believed every word that Bart had spoken.

"I'm in a fix—a terrible fix!" he groaned. "This is dreadful—dreadful!"

"Mend it, then!" cried Bart. "Quick! if you have one spark of sense or manhood in you. There's a knife—cut this rope."

With quivering fingers Colonel Harrington took up from the desk the office knife used for cutting string. It was keen-bladed as a razor. Unsteady and bungling as was his stroke, he severed the rope partly, and Bart burst his bonds free.

"Stay here," called out the young express agent sharply. "I hold you responsible for this office till I return!"

He dashed outside like a rocket, scanned the whole roadway expanse, and darted for the freight yards with the speed of the wind.

The electric arc lights were sparsely scattered, but there was sufficient illumination for him to make out a fugitive figure just crossing the broad roadway towards the freight tracks.

It was Lem Wacker. A train of empty box freights blocked his way. He stooped, made a diving scurry under one of them, and was lost to view.

Bart ran as he had never run before. The train cleared the tracks as he reached the spot where Wacker had disappeared.

At that moment above the jangling, clumping activity of the yards there arose on the night air one frightful, piercing shriek.

Bart halted with a nameless shock, for the utterance was distinctly human and curdling. He glanced after the receding train, fancying that Wacker might have got caught under the cars and was being dragged along with them.

That roadbed was clear, however. Two hundred feet to the right was a second train. Its forward section was moving off, having just thrown some cars against others stationary on a siding.

Bart ran towards these. Wacker could not have so suddenly disappeared in any other direction. He crossed between bumpers, and glanced eagerly all around. There was no hiding-place nearer than the repair shops, and they were five hundred feet distant.

Wacker could not possibly have reached their precincts in the limited space of time afforded since Bart had last lost sight of him.

"He is hiding in some of those cars," decided Bart, "or he has swung onto the bumpers of the section pulling out—hark!"

Bart pricked up his ears. A strange sound floated on the air—a low, even, musical tinkle.

Its source could not be far distant. Bart ran along the side of the stationary freights.

"It is Wacker, sure," he breathed, "for that is the same sound made by the little alarm clock he bought at the sale this afternoon."

The last vibrating tintinnabulations of the clock died away as Bart discovered his enemy.

Lem Wacker's burly figure and white face were discernible against the direct flare of an arc light. He seemed a part of the bumpers of two cars. Bart flared a match once, and uttered the single word:

"Caught."

Lem Wacker was clinging to the upright brake rod, and swaying there. His face was bloodless and he was writhing with pain. One foot was clamped tight, a crushed, jellied mass between two bumpers.

It seemed that his foot must have slipped just as the forward freights were switched down. This had caused that frenzied yell. Perhaps the thought of the money had impelled him not to repeat it, but the little alarm clock which he carried in his pocket had betrayed him.

Bart took in the situation at a glance. He was shocked and unnerved, but he stepped close to the writhing culprit.

"Lem Wacker," he said, "where is that money envelope?"

"In my pocket," groaned Wacker. "I've got it this time—crippled for life!"

The young express agent did not have to search for the stolen money package. It protruded from Wacker's side pocket. As he glanced it over, he saw that it was practically intact. Wacker had torn open only one corner, sufficient to observe its contents. Bart placed the envelope in his own pocket.

"I'm fainting!" declared Wacker.

Bart crossed under the bumpers to the other side of the freights. He swept the scene with a searching glance, finally detected the shifting glow of a night watchman's lantern, and ran over to its source.

He knew the watchman, and asked the man to accompany him, explaining as they went along that Lem Wacker had got caught between two freights, was held a prisoner in the bumpers with his foot crushed, and pointed the sufferer out as they neared the freights.

Wacker by this time had sunk flat on the bumpers, his limbs twisted up under him, but he managed to hold on to the brake rod. He only moaned and writhed when the horrified watchman spoke to him.

"I'll have to get help," said the latter. "They will have to switch off the front freights to get him loose."

The watchman took out his whistle and blew a kind of a call on the telegraphic system. Two minutes later Bart saw McCarthy hurriedly rounding a corner of the freight depot, and advanced towards him.

The young express agent briefly and confidentially imparted to his old friend the fact that Lem Wacker had tried to steal some money from the express office, and had got his deserts at last.

"Get him clear of the bumpers," said Bart, "carry him to the express office, call for a surgeon, and don't let him be taken away from there till I show up."

"What's moving, Stirling?" inquired McCarthy.

"Something very important. Wacker seems to be punished enough already, and I do not know that I want him placed under arrest, but he knows something he must tell me before he gets out of my reach."

"Then you had better wait."

"I can't do that," said Bart. "I have a special to deliver, on personal orders from Mr. Leslie, the express superintendent."

Bart consulted his watch. It was five minutes of eleven.

"Only a little over an hour," he reflected. "I want to hustle!"

He saw to it that the recovered package was safely stowed in an inner pocket, and started by the shortest cut he knew from the yards.

Bart did not even pause at the express office, where he had left Colonel Harrington. He ran all the way half across the silent, sleeping town, and never halted until he reached the Haven homestead.

He did not go to the front door, but, well acquainted with the disposition of the household, paused under a rear window, picked up a handful of gravel, threw it against the upper panes, and gave three low but distinct whistling trills.

He could hear a prompt rustling. In less than forty seconds Darry Haven stuck his head out of the window.

"Hello!" he hailed, rubbing his eyes.

"Come down, quick," directed Bart. "Bring Bob, too."

"What's the lark, Bart?"

"No lark at all," answered Bart—"strictly business. Don't take a minute. No need disturbing the folks. You can be back inside of an hour."

Bob, hatless and without a collar, came sliding down the lightning rod two minutes later. Darry landed on the ground almost simultaneously, simply letting himself drop from the window sill.

"Two dollars apiece for half an hour's work," said Bart, and then told his companions the details of the special mission in which he required their services.

"Ginger! but you're nerve and action," commented the admiring Bob.

"And good to your friends," put in Darry.

They passed the pickle factory. It stood on the edge of the town, and the residence of the senior partner of Martin & Company, whose name had been mentioned in the telegram, was nearly half a mile further away.

"Eleven thirty-five," announced Bart, a trifle anxiously. "It does not give us much time. I hope there's no slip anywhere."

At just fifteen minutes of midnight the strange trio passed up the graveled walk leading to the Martin mansion. The front door had a ponderous old-fashioned knocker, and Bart plied it without ceremony.

He began to grow nervous as three minutes passed by, and not the least attention was paid to his summons.

Suddenly an upper window was thrust up, and a man's head came into view.

"Who's there?" demanded a gruff, impatient voice.

"Is this Mr. Martin, Mr. A.B. Martin?" inquired Bart.

"Yes, it is—what do you want?"

"I have an express package for you," explained Bart.

"Oh, you have?" snapped Mr. Martin. "What the mischief do you mean waking a man up at midnight on a thing like that! Deliver it at the factory in the morning."

The speaker, muttering direfully under his breath, was about to slam down the window.

"Wait one moment, Mr. Martin," called up Bart sharply. "This is a special delivery, and a very important matter. I tender you this package in the presence of these witnesses, and it is a legal delivery. If you decline to come down and take it, and I leave it on your doorstep at the call of the first tramp who happens to come along, I have done my duty, and the loss is yours—a matter of fifteen thousand dollars."

"What! what!" shouted Martin.

"That is the amount."

"From—Dunn & Son?"

"I guess that's right," said Bart. "Will you come down and take it?"

Martin did not reply. He disappeared from the window, but left it open. Bart heard him muttering to himself.

"Supposing he doesn't come down?" questioned Bob, in a whisper.

"I think he will," said Bart. "Eleven forty-eight. Mr. Martin," he called out loudly, "I can't wait here all night."

"Shut up!" retorted an angry voice—"I'm hurrying all I can."

"He isn't!" spoke Darry, in a low tone to Bart. "He's on to the business, and playing for time."

"And he's beat us!" breathed Bob—"hear there! twelve o'clock. Your delivery is no good, Bart! It's just struck a new day!"

"S—sh!" warned Bart, as a clock inside the house rang out twelve silvery strokes. "The clock is wrong. We've got five minutes and a half yet."

In about two minutes a light flashed in the hall, the front door was unlocked, and Martin appeared, half-dressed. Bart relievedly put up his watch. It was just three minutes of twelve.

He instantly placed the express envelope in Martin's hands, slipping into the vestibule.

"Mr. Martin," he said, "it is necessary for you to verify the contents of this package. An accident happened to it, as you see."

Martin tore the envelope clear open, and glanced over fifteen bills of one thousand dollar denomination each.

"All right," he said gruffly.

"Will you sign this receipt?" asked Bart politely, tendering the slip of paper he had prepared at the office for this especial occasion. "Thank you," he added, as the pickle man scrawled a penciled signature at the bottom of the paper.

"I take this money," said Mr. Martin, looking up with a peculiar expression on his face, "because it is delivered by you, but I shall return it to Dunn & Son to-morrow."

"That is your business, Mr. Martin," said Bart politely.

"It is, and—something more! I call on you and your witnesses to notice that the fifteen thousand dollars was not delivered to me until six minutes after twelve, too late to make the tender legal, which makes the contract null and void."

Mr. Martin, with a triumphant sweep of his hand, pointed to a big clock at the end of the long hall.

"I beg your pardon," said Bart, holding up his watch, "but I keep official time, and it is exactly thirty seconds to midnight. Listen!"

And thirty seconds later, from the Pleasantville court house tower, the town bell rang out twelve musical strokes.



CHAPTER XXIX

BROUGHT TO TIME

"I'll go!" said Colonel Jeptha Harrington, magnate of Pleasantville.

"All right," said Bart Stirling, express company agent.

It was three o'clock in the morning, and the scene was the little express office where so many unusual and exciting happenings had transpired within twenty-four hours.

The colonel's announcement was given in the tone of a man facing a hard proposition and forced to accept it—or something worse.

Bart's reply was calm and off-handed. During a two hours' siege with the military man he had never lost his temper or his wits, and had come off the victor.

When Bart had concluded his very creditable piece of business with Mr. Martin of the pickle factory, he had sent Darry and Bob Haven back to bed, and had forthwith returned to the express office.

Colonel Harrington, scared-looking and sullen, was still there. He seemed to have met his match in the young express agent, and dared not defy him.

Bart found McCarthy, the night watchman, on guard outside, who told him that they had got Lem Wacker clear of the bumpers, had carried him into the express office, made up a rude litter, and had sent for a surgeon.

The latter had just concluded his labors as Bart entered. Lem Wacker lay with his foot bandaged up, conscious, and in no intense pain, for the surgeon had given him some deadening medicine.

"He belongs at the hospital," the surgeon advised Bart. "That foot will have to come off."

"As bad as that!" murmured Bart.

"Yes. I will telephone for the ambulance when I leave here."

"Very well," acquiesced Bart. "Can I speak with the patient?"

"If he will speak with you. He's an ugly, ungrateful mortal!"

Bart went over to the side of the prostrate man.

"Mr. Wacker," he said, "I do not wish to trouble you in your present condition, but something has got to be understood before you leave this place. You go to the hospital as a prisoner or as a patient, just as you elect."

"Pile it on! pile it on!" growled Wacker. "You've got the upper hand, and you'll squeeze me, I suppose. All the same, those who stand back of me will take care of me or I'll explode a bomb that will shatter Pleasantville to pieces!"

Colonel Harrington shuddered at this palpable allusion to himself.

"And I'm going to sue the railroad company for my smashed foot. What do you want?"

"This, Mr. Wacker," pursued Bart quietly, "you have to-night committed a crime that means State's prison for ten years if I make the complaint."

"I'll have a partner in it, all the same!" remarked Wacker grimly.

The colonel groaned.

"You were after a package that belongs to a friend of mine," continued Bart. "I want to know why, and I want to know what you have done with that person."

"Don't you torture me!" cried Wacker irritably—"don't you let him," he blared out to the quacking magnate. "I won't say a word. Let Harrington do as he pleases. He's the king bee! Only, just this, Harrington, you take care of me or I'll blow the whole business."

"Yes, yes," stammered the colonel in a mean, servile way, approaching the litter, "leave it all to me, Wacker. Don't raise a row, Stirling," he pleaded piteously, "don't have him arrested, I'll foot the bill, I'll square everything. This matter must be hushed—yes, yes, hushed up!" hoarsely groaned the military man. "Oh, its dreadful, dreadful!"

Bart felt that he had matters in strong control, spoke a word to McCarthy and, when the ambulance came, allowed them to take Lem Wacker to the hospital.

Then he and Colonel Harrington were alone. The latter was in a pitiable condition of fear and humiliation.

"See here, Stirling," he said finally, "I'll confess the truth. I've done wrong. There's a paper in that package that would mean disgrace for me if it was made public. I'll own to that, but it's over a dead and buried business, and it can do no good to make it public property now. I warn you if it is, I will shoot myself through the head."

Bart doubted if the colonel had the courage to carry out his threat, but he temporized with the great man, got him to make enough admissions to somewhat clear the situation, and the long discussion ended with the announcement by Colonel Harrington that he "would go."

In other words, he confessed that Baker, Bart's friend and the highest bidder for the mysterious express package, was a prisoner in his barn.

In some way Lem Wacker had become aware of Baker's secret, whatever that was, and had helped the colonel in his efforts to suppress Baker and secure possession of the package.

Bart was shocked at this exhibition of cold-blooded villainy on the part of a representative member of the community, although he had never had much use for the pompous, domineering old tyrant, who now led the way through the silent Streets of Pleasantville as meek as a lamb.

He took Bart through the beautiful grounds of his sumptuous home, and to a windowless padlocked room in the loft of the stable.

Poor Baker, his hands secured with stout pieces of wire, arose from a stool with a gleam of hope on his pallid face as Bart followed the colonel into the room.

"See here, Baker—which isn't your name—but it will do—" said the colonel at once, "things have turned your way. Your friend here, young Stirling, has got the whip-hand—I am cornered, and admit it. I want to make a proposition to you, Stirling needn't hear it. When you have decided, we will call him into the room again and he will see that you get your rights. Is that satisfactory?"

"What shall I do?" asked Baker of Bart.

"Hear what Colonel Harrington has to say. If it suits you, settle up this matter as you think right. I am here to see that he does as he promises."

Bart stepped out of the room. There was a continuous hum of conversation for nearly half an hour. Then the colonel opened the door.

"I'm to go into the house to write out something Baker wants," he explained. "Then I'll come back."

"Very well," nodded Bart.

He tried to engage Baker in conversation, but the latter, his hands free now, paced the room nervously, acting like some caged animal.

"I'm afraid of him!" he declared. "I don't know that I am doing what is best. He's a bad man. He begs me to spare him for the sake of his family."

"Is this a matter where settlement will do any injustice to others?" asked Bart.

"None, now—it is past that."

"Then follow the dictates of your own judgment, Mr. Baker," directed Bart, "being sure that you are acting with a clear conscience."

Colonel Harrington, when he returned, brought two documents. Baker looked them over.

"Are they satisfactory?" inquired the colonel anxiously.

"Yes," answered Baker.

"Now understand, there is to be no gossip about this affair?" insisted the magnate.

"I shan't talk," said Baker.

"And I am to have that express package?"

"Give it to him, Stirling."

Bart took the mysterious unclaimed package from his pocket. Colonel Harrington seized it with a satisfied cry.

"You have wronged myself and others deeply, Colonel Harrington," said Baker in a grave, reproachful tone, "but you have made some amends. I forgive you, and I hope you will be a better man."



CHAPTER XXX

"STILL HIGHER!"

Bart Stirling was a proud and happy boy as he stood at the door of the express office looking down the tracks of the B. & M.

A new spur was being constructed, and it divided to semi-inclose a substantial foundation which was the start of the new and commodious express office. The blue sky, smiling down on the busy scene, was no more serene than the prospect which the future seemed to offer for the successful young express agent.

With his last reckless crime Lem Wacker had ceased to be a disturbing element at Pleasantville. After two months' confinement he had limped out of the hospital, out of town, and out of Bart Stirling's life.

Colonel Jeptha Harrington himself had left town with the beginning of winter. It was said he intended to make an extended trip in Europe.

With his departure, a new Mr. Baker seemed to spring into existence. Divested of his disguise, no longer a fear-filled roustabout fugitive, Bart's strange friend had found a steady, lucrative position at the hotel, and Bart felt that he had certainly been the means of doing some real good in the world every time he looked at the happy, contented face of his protege.

Concerning all the details of Baker's past, Bart never knew the entire truth.

Baker felt, however, that it was due to his champion that he explain in the main the mystery of his connection with Colonel Harrington, and he told a strange story.

It seemed that the purse-proud colonel had a poor brother living in another State.

This brother owned a farm on which there lived with him a man named Adams, a widower, and his little daughter, Dorothy.

Adams was a close friend of Samuel Harrington, and out of his earnings saved the place from being taken on a mortgage.

Samuel Harrington always told Adams that he had made a will, and that in case of his sudden death the farm would go to him. He gave Adams a letter certifying to his having a claim of over three thousand dollars against the property, which he told Adams to show to his rich brother when he died, asserting that, although Colonel Harrington had shamefully neglected him, he would never dishonorably repudiate a claim of that kind.

When Samuel Harrington died, his brother appeared, took possession of the farm as only heir, and cruelly drove Mr. Adams and his child from the place.

He tore up the written statement Adams gave him, ridiculed his claims, and, no will being found, sold the place for a song and left Adams an invalid pauper.

Adams had done Baker, or, as his real name was, Albert Baker Mills, a great service once.

Baker, or Mills, supported Adams and his child for a year. Adams spent all his time bemoaning his fate, and haunted the old farm in a search of the will of Samuel Harrington.

One day he did not appear, nor the following. Early on the morning of the third day he staggered into the house, weak and fainting. He was taken down with a fever, was delirious for a week, and at the end of that time died.

Just before his death he tried to tell something about the will. Baker made out that he had found it, that it was at Pleasantville, nothing more.

After his friend's death, Baker wrote a letter to Colonel Harrington. He accused him of his dishonorable conduct, and threatened to publicly expose him if he did not provide in some way for the little orphan, Dorothy, for whom he had found a home with a poor relative.

A week later Colonel Harrington sought out Baker, told him he had trumped up a charge against him that would land him in jail, which Baker later discovered was the truth, and gave him twenty-four hours to leave the country.

From that time the poor fellow was a fugitive, venturing to appear only in disguise at Pleasantville. Adams, it seemed, had found the will and had sent it to Pleasantville addressed to himself, not daring to face the colonel with the important document in his possession, but never living to carry out his plan.

In the settlement with Colonel Harrington, Baker had received a letter exculpating him totally from the trumped up charge, and a check for five thousand dollars, which money was now held in trust by a bank to provide for little Dorothy's future.

Bart felt much gratified over the way all these tangled strands in the warp and woof of his young life had been straightened out, but he experienced a final blessing that filled him with unutterable joy and gratefulness.

A week previous his father had returned from a month's treatment by a city expert oculist.

Robert Stirling came back to Pleasantville a well man.

That was a joyful night at the little Stirling home, when Mr. Stirling once again looked with restored sight upon the faces of the many friends who respected and loved him.

Mr. Stirling, while in the city, had been an invited guest at the home of Mr. Leslie, and the express superintendent had learned a good deal more about his devoted son than he had ever known before.

"Come out of it!" hailed a jolly voice, and Bart was disturbed in his pleasant reverie by the appearance of Darry and Bob Haven.

"It's settled!" cried the latter ecstatically?—"we're going into the regular business at last."

"I don't quite catch on," returned Bart.

"The printing and publishing business," put in Darry. "We have got the money together for a nice little plant, and father and mother are willing that we shall go ahead. Some day you'll see us running a regular newspaper."

"Well, I wish you good luck—you certainly deserve it," answered the young express agent, warmly.

"There is only one drawback," resumed Bob. "We'll have to give up helping you."

"Don't let that bother you. I'll find somebody else. Say, it will be fine to start a regular newspaper," went on Bart. "I guess you'd wake some of the old-timers up—they are so moss-eaten. This town needs a bright, up-to-date sheet."

"We are going to push the printing and publishing business all we can," answered Darry, earnestly. How he and his brother carried out their project I shall relate in another story, to be called, "Working Hard to Win." It was no light undertaking, but the boys entered into it with a vigor that was bound to command success.

"You see, father can help us a good deal," said Bob. "He used to be an editor, you know. And more than that, mother can make us whatever pictures we may need."

"Oh, you'll be right in it, I know," laughed Bart. "When you start your newspaper put me down as the first subscriber. Your subscription money is ready whenever you want it."

At that moment a messenger appeared.

"Letter for you," said he to the young express agent, and hurried about his business.

"From the express people," murmured Bart, tearing open the letter.

As he perused it, such a quick, bright glow flashed into his face and eyes, that the watchful Darry at once surmised that Bart had received a communication out of the ordinary.

"Good news, Bart?" he inquired.

"Read it," said Bart simply, and quick-witted Darry saw that he was almost too overcome to speak further.

The letter was from Mr. Leslie the superintendent, and contained two paragraphs.

The first stated that from the fifteenth of the coming month Mr. Robert Stirling would resume his position as express agent at Pleasantville, thenceforward made a "Class B" station, at a salary of seventy dollars a month.

The second paragraph requested Mr. Bart Stirling to report at headquarters for assignment to duty at a city office as assistant manager.

Darry Haven reached out and caught the hand of his loyal friend in a warm, glad clasp.

"Capital!" he cried enthusiastically—"in line with your motto, Bart Stirling—higher still!"

THE END