The road from the Cliffs, where the Castle is located, goes westerly as far as Clarkdale. Sedona, where the three speculators hoped to be before dark, was located several miles from this road, about half the distance between Clarkdale and the Cliffs.
The chauffeur, having had a painful lesson about careful driving, decided it would be wiser to halt long enough at the Cliffs to change the leaking tire, than to continue on and stop now and then to pump it full of air. This took time, but the men assisted in every way possible in order to gain time.
Once more they were traveling along the road which runs to Clarkdale, and hopes were in the ascendant that Sedona would be reached by sundown. Very few travelers were met that day, and when, just before turning off the main road, to reach Sedona, a very fine automobile was spied, like a tiny dot, coming from the opposite direction, it attracted general attention.
The two cars turned into the Sedona road with but a few minutes’ difference in time—Mr. Dalken’s car led, however. As the chauffeur found a good bit of road ahead, he turned and spoke through the tube at his side.
“I know the driver of that car, sir. He comes from Williams, and has been down to Flagstaff twice this past ten days. He had a man from Prescott, who’s been looking out for some men to arrive from Chicago, but they didn’t show up. I reckon Mr. Dunlap got tired of waiting around, and is on his way back to the ranch where he hopes to make a clean-up.”
“Do you know the man called Dunlap?” asked Mr. Dalken, giving his friends a silencing look, when they would have exclaimed at the surprising information just heard from their chauffeur.
“Only from hearsay. Jim—that’s the owner of that rear car—says he’s very flush with his coin, and hired the car for a week. I saw the man at Flagstaff the last time he waited there for the men he expected.”
“Did Jim hear who the men were—the ones that didn’t show up?” asked Mr. Dalken, trying hard to keep the eagerness out of his tones as he spoke.
“No; but I overheard him ask the agent at the railway station if he was quite certain that three men did not come from Chicago and get off at Flagstaff. And the agent said he was sure! He also told Dunlap that the only men to arrive at Flagstaff in the week, were three from Ash Fork, but they were not millionaires, because they were dressed like any other hard-working chaps—not a diamond or spare penny to be seen.”
“You seem to be an observing young man, chauffeur,” ventured Mr. Fuzzier.