As the boy walked briskly toward the boat, accompanied by the two men, he saw a man in uniform beckoning to the officer, who pretended not to see him. However, he said to the surgeon, in a tone of great vexation which Clay did not fail to note: “There’s Sergeant Wilcox! If he gets his eyes on the boy before I do, he will claim the reward. He is too soft to carry this thing through, anyway. He’ll let the boys talk him out of the money. We’d better make haste to the boat. If Wilcox wasn’t my superior officer, I’d take a crack at his head with a billy. He’s always butting in!”
Clay had heard enough to convince him that Sergeant Wilcox was the man he wanted to talk with! Should he prove considerate and reasonable, he should receive the information which would be worth $10,000 to him—the information which a little decency on the part of DeYoung might have won for him!
When the policeman and the surgeon started toward the boat at a pace calculated to get them there before Sergeant Wilcox could overtake them, Clay hung back and DeYoung seized him by the arm to hurry him along. The boy drew away and ran toward the Sergeant, who advanced to meet him.
“What’s the matter here?” the Sergeant asked, not unkindly.
“This officer has arrested me, and threatens to arrest my chums,” Clay explained, “and I want you to hear my story.”
“Certainly, my boy,” replied the Sergeant “You don’t look like a very hardened criminal,” he added, as DeYoung approached with a pair of handcuffs dangling in his hands, “so I guess we won’t have you ironed.”
“This boy and his chums,” stormed DeYoung, “are connected with the train robbers, and I have arrested them all as such. I’m now going to the boat you see down there to take them all to jail.”
“One of the boys has a broken leg,” pleaded Clay, “and ought not to be moved. And everything we have will be stolen if we are taken away from our boat and locked up.”
“It won’t injure the boy to be moved.” the surgeon cut in, “and I’ll see that their property is not molested. We, DeYoung and I, think we have that reward cinched!”
“Oh, you do!” cried Clay, with flashing eyes. “You’d ruin us boys in the hope of getting it, too!”