Frank kept at his heels. At first there was nothing to be seen or heard and then the boy, catching his breath, pointed to the forward end of the car where a faint glow seemed to come from the side door of the baggage compartment. The boy darted forward ahead of Skinner. A glance showed one section of the double doors shoved back and a light in the car. On the ground beneath the door was an empty box.
As Frank came opposite the open door and caught sight of the interior of the car his heart leaped. Crouched over an object of some kind was a man on his knees. By his side was a spluttering candle. Surrounding the intruder on all sides were dozens of cans of gasoline. The knowledge that at any instant the Teton might be blown to pieces was the only thought in the boy’s mind. There was no time to think of the peril of encountering the intruder unarmed.
“Put that light out!” yelled Frank. “Put it out. You’ll blow up the car,” he shouted as he leaped on the box beneath the door. Instantly the light went out; there was a rush in the car and then the boy, already half through the door, was thrust backwards as if by a kick, and a form hurled itself over his head.
The intruder and Frank rolled down the slight embankment almost together and both against Sam Skinner.
“Stop!” yelled Sam as the man scrambled to his feet and stumbled away in the darkness. But the intruder did not stop and, with one quick look to make sure that it was Frank at his feet, Sam’s revolver spit a streak of fire toward the fugitive. Without waiting to ask questions the old hunter, his fighting blood aroused, disappeared after the man. Frank, now alarmed for the first time over the chance he had taken, got to his feet. As he did so he felt an ache in his shoulder. It was not enough to stop him, however, and he sprang on to the box again and into the dark compartment of the car.
There were roof electric lights in the car with a switch at the rear door. Stumbling toward it, the boy finally turned on the lights. A glance showed that a thief had been at work.
“And we got him just in time,” chuckled Frank to himself. Standing by the open door were all the gun cases of the party. In the middle of the car was Mr. Mackworth’s English sole leather gun trunk. A sharp knife had been passed completely around the top and still stuck in the cut leather, which in another moment could have been lifted out like a loose panel. The car door had been pried open with a railroad spike bar.
Frank had hardly made this examination before there was a knock at the compartment door and a call to open it. It was Mr. Mackworth, breathless. Frank stuttered out the facts. Almost before he had finished, his uncle in slippers and pajamas was out of the door and off in the darkness in the direction Sam and the fugitive had taken. The door lock was broken but, pulling the section in place, Frank turned off the lights, hurried back through the car and—without arousing its other occupants—started after the would-be thief and his pursuers.