THE ABANDONED MOTOR CAR.
"I'll tell you," said Ted, "if you'll take a seat and keep quiet until I get the thing straightened out in my own mind, for the incidents of the past hour certainly have got me going."
Bud sat down and waited patiently for Ted, who was thinking deeply.
"I didn't tell you the precise object of our visit to St. Louis," began Ted, "not because I didn't trust your ability to keep a secret, but in order to keep every one else in the dark."
"D'yer mean ter say that ye hev stalled me along ter this town ter give me a leetle airin', an' not ter sell hosses?" asked Bud indignantly.
"Not exactly. I want to sell the horses for the top price, but there was something else behind it."
"A large man astraddle o' ye with a keen an' bitin' bowie at yer throat. Yer must be hard up fer amoosement."
"Not that, either," said Ted, laughing. "I manage to get all the amusement that's coming to me."
"I'm still gropin' fer enlightenment."
"Here goes, then. For a couple of months the trains on the Union Pacific, in Nebraska and Wyoming, have been running the gantlet between bands of train robbers. If a train missed being robbed at one place, it was almost sure to get it at another, especially if it carried wealth of any description."