vindictively, and
his scowl was grotesquely hideous. "Can you hang them, Mr. Lidgerwood?"

"Yes. Flemister, and a man whom Judson has identified as Hallock, were
the two who ditched 204 at Silver Switch last night. The charge in
Judson's warrant reads,'train-wrecking and murder.'"

The trainmaster smote the desk with his fist.

"I'll add one more strand to the rope--Hallock's rope," he gritted
ferociously. "You remember what I told you about that loosened rail that
caused the wreck in the Crosswater Hills? You said Hallock had gone to
Navajo to see Cruikshanks; he did go to Navajo, but he got there just
exactly four hours after 202 had gone on past Navajo, and he came on
foot, walking down the track from the Hills!"

"Where did you get that?" asked Lidgerwood quickly.

"From the agent at Navajo. I wasn't satisfied with the way it shaped up,
and I did a little investigating on my own hook."

"Pass him up," said Benson briefly, "and let's go over this lay-out for
to-night again. I shall be out of touch down in the yards, and I want to
get it straight in my head."

Lidgerwood went carefully over the details again, and again cautioned
Benson about the _Nadia_ and its party. From that the talk ran upon the
ill luck which had projected the pleasure-party into the thick of
things; upon Mrs. Brewster's obstinacy--which Lidgerwood most
inconsistently defended--and upon the probability of the president's
return from the Copperette--also in the thick of things, and it was
close upon eight o'clock when the two lieutenants went to their
respective posts.

It was fully an hour farther along, and the tense strain of suspense was
beginning to tell upon the man who sat thoughtful and alone in the
second-floor office of the Crow's Nest, when Benson ran up to report the
situation in the yards.

"Everything quiet so far," was the news he brought. "We've got the Nadia
on the east spur, where the folks can slip out and make their get-away,
if they have to. There are several little squads of the discharged men
hanging around, but not many more than usual. The east and west yards
are clear, and the three sections of the mid-night freight are crewed
and ready to pull out when the time comes. The folkses are playing dummy
whist in the Nadia; and Gridley is holding the fort at the shops with
the toughest-looking lot of myrmidons you ever laid your eyes on."

Once again Lidgerwood was making tiny squares on his desk blotter.

"I'm th