ld.

"Let me see," said Jack, "when did you start the diary?"

"The very day I was first employed on the road."

"And you have kept it faithfully?"

"Yes, I have recorded every incident of importance as it occurred, even
to the names of every conductor and official of the road."

We will not relate in detail Jack's patient following up of all the
incidents in the diary, but he spent three hours in studying every
incident until he came to the record of an accident where a man had
stepped out upon the platform, had lost his balance, and had been hurled
to the ground and killed, and in this incident there appeared a note
stating as follows:

"This was a very sad affair. The man lived fifteen minutes
after having fallen from the train. He made an effort to
say something, but could only speak the word _mon_, and he
was probably a Frenchman, as he evidently desired to say in
French my wife or daughter or something."

When Jack read the account of this accident there came a strange glitter
in his eyes, and also a look of gratification to his face. It was but a
trifling incident, and there were hundreds of accidents on record, but
here was a milepost for our hero--yes, a clue, as he really believed.

"That was a strange accident," he said.

"Yes, a very sad accident. Nothing strange about it, but very sad. The
old man's body was never claimed; I remember the incident well."

"But tell me, when did it happen?"

"October 19, 18--; yes, I remember well, it was early in the afternoon.
The man fell from my car; I was first at his side. I heard him utter the
word _mon_, and that is all he did say. He attempted to speak, and there
was a wild, eager look upon his face, but he soon became unconscious and
died without uttering another word except the French word _mon_."

"Possibly he meant to exclaim '_Mon Dieu_'," suggested Jack.

"Yes, I guess that was it. Let me see, that means 'My God.' I did not
think of that--yes, 'My God' is what he attempted to say in French."

"And you remember all about the incident clearly?"

"Yes, I do."

"The man probably came from New York," suggested Jack.

"Why do you ask that?"

"Because he had black mud on his boots."

"Well, he didn't; the man was a Jersey man."

"How do you know?"

"He had Jersey red mud on his shoes."

"Oh, he wore shoes?"

"No, he did not, he wore boots. Let me see, yes, he wore boots. He was
probably a farm hand, a friendless fe