Soon after the two men separated.
Dyke Darrel went at once to the depot, and soon after nine that evening he was speeding northward at the rate of forty miles an hour. At the first stop outside of the city three passengers boarded the train. One was a short, thick-set man, with beard and hair of a dark color; the others were women. The man entered the smoking car and thrust himself into an unoccupied seat, and glanced keenly about him.
The man had no ticket, but paid the conductor to a station a hundred miles from the city.
While sitting with his back to the aisle, a touch on the shoulder roused him.
"Eh, it's you, Ruggles?"
"Ahem—seat occupied?"
"No."
The man we have met on a previous occasion, Professor Darlington Ruggles, settled himself beside the late comer.
"Ahem—fine evening."
A grunt answered the Professor's attempt to be sociable. At length, after casting a keen glance about the car, to find that but few passengers were present, and those of but little consequence, Professor Ruggles said: