“Yes,” returned the other. “I’ll just leave word for my traps to be sent on, and then I’m with you.”
Three minutes later the two men passed out of the hotel entrance, and, entering a cab, were driven rapidly away into the night.
[CHAPTER I.]
AT THE MERCY OF CONSPIRATORS.
SILAS K. HAVERLY, millionaire and explorer, settled himself comfortably back in the corner of a first-class smoker. He had ten minutes to wait ere the express—which was to bear him sixty miles across country to Stanwich, the nearest station to Garth Hilton’s place—was timed to start.
To look at him no one would ever have imagined that he was the owner of a colossal fortune—one of the railway kings of America. Yet such he was. Starting at the very foot of Fortune’s ladder, he had worked his way upward, until he owned the greater part of the vast network of rails upon which he had worked as a boy.
A wiry figure of a man he was, with endurance written all over him. He had a cool, determined face, and the firm set of his chin revealed the dogged resolution which had enabled him to amass one of the largest fortunes in the world. Altogether, he was not a man with whom one would care to trifle.
“H’m!” he muttered, blowing a cloud of smoke from a fragrant cigar, “I guess I’m having it all to myself this trip.”
Indeed, it did seem as though he was to travel alone, for the time of departure arrived, and all the passengers appeared to have taken their places. There was a whistle from the guard, a warning shriek from the engine, then the iron monster began to glide out of the station. As it did so, two men rushed across the platform, flung open the door of Haverly’s compartment, and, despite the cries of the officials to “Stand back,” precipitated themselves into the carriage.
“Only just in time,” one of them said with an oath, as he slammed to the door behind him; “it would have been all up with the scheme if we had missed this train, for——”