Again a smile swept the face of the young detective.

"It seems that you never met Dyke Darrel, Mr. Holden."

"Never; but—-"

"You see him now at any rate."

"What?"

"I am Dyke Darrel."

"YOU?"

"The same."

"Dyke Darrel, the railroad detective; the fellow who captured the brute Crogan, and broke up the counterfeiters' nest near Iron Mountain; the man who has sent more criminals over the road than any other detective in the wide West—YOU?"

"The same, at your service," and Darrel bowed and smiled again.