Stationing themselves near the rear door, they waited.
In a few minutes the cars reached the curve and went around.
As the last car turned they dashed out upon the rear platform, and one after another they sprang to the ground.
Then they plunged late the bushes.
Gathering speed again, the express train ran away without them, and a few minutes afterward a locomotive came flying along in pursuit of it with an engineer, a stoker and the sheriff in the cab.
The bandits glared from their coverts at Timberlake like so many wild beasts as he sped by, ignorant of the trick they played upon him, and nearly all of them gripped their pistols with a burning desire to fire at him.
It would have been too rash to do that.
In fact Jesse observed their anxiety, and hissed in warning tones:
"Don't drop him!"
In a moment more the locomotive was gone.