Back from the verge of this cliff in a thick wood was an old charcoal burner’s cabin. Zeph Dallas, in attempting to follow McCarrey’s ruffians who had dynamited the trestle pillar (Whitey had not been in that crime) was captured, as Ralph believed, and was held prisoner in the charcoal burner’s shack.
At the time of the wreck of Number 33 in Shadow Valley, some of these same employees of McCarrey, lurking in the bushes, had recognized Cherry Hopkins and had seized her during the confusion. Binding her and muffling her cries, the rascals had taken her by a roundabout way to the same shack in which Zeph was held prisoner.
With this information wrenched from the reluctant Whitey, Ralph, Supervisor Hopkins, Adair and his men, went on to the cabin. They approached it with much care, for a large band of the outlaws were on guard.
Ralph and Mr. Adair, who were well informed regarding the identity of the striking shopmen, saw no ex-railroad employee in the clearing where the shack stood. But McCarrey and his chief henchman, Falk, were there.
Without doubt, although McCarrey had wormed himself into the confidence of the dissatisfied shopmen and other employees of the division, he had done so merely for his own personal aggrandizement. He hated the supervisor of the division and he had worked merely to control the strike fund of the ill-advised railroaders and to hurt Mr. Barton Hopkins.
Chance, it seemed, had put Cherry into the power of this scoundrel. When he heard that she had been captured he left Rockton immediately and took up his personal fight against the supervisor. He knew Hopkins had some money and he was determined to make him ransom his daughter.
With this knowledge in their possession, Ralph and his companions attacked the gang at the charcoal burner’s shack with considerable determination. Although they had firearms, they did not have to use them. Advancing under the chief detective’s direction on the clearing from all sides, the rescuers clubbed their men down, frightening them as much as they injured them.
While the men were fighting, Ralph ran to the door of the shack. He had already heard Zeph’s hoarse voice shouting. Ralph burst in the door with a stone, shattering the lock.
As he did so a man hurled himself upon the young railroader. Although the attack was sudden and from the rear, the young fellow knew that his antagonist was Andy McCarrey.
“I’ve got you, anyway!” growled out the chief of the band of scoundrels. “You got into that house one night. I remember you! And I bet you gave us away.”