Curiously enough, the colonel did not connect the disappearance of his child with that of Crazy Jim. He started to hunt for the little one among the Indians and the outlaws in the mountains.
Two years passed, and then one night a good-for-nothing miner named Duffy was shot in a quarrel over a game of cards. On his dying bed Duffy confessed that he had once been intimate with Crazy Jim and that the latter had acknowledged stealing Dottie.
A hunt was at once made for the abductor. It was said he had gone to San Francisco, and later on he was traced to Chicago, but there the trail was lost until long after, when a tramp turned up who spoke of having seen Crazy Jim around New York.
Without delay Colonel Dartwell had come East and scoured the metropolis. While here he had fallen in with footpads who had sought to rob him.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
A JOYOUS MEETING.
By the time Colonel Dartwell’s story was told he and Jerry had landed in the metropolis, and a hurried walk of a few minutes brought them to Nellie Ardell’s apartment. Mrs. Flannigan was waiting for our hero, having put both of the children to bed.