The next morning, the conductor reported that a passenger was missing from the car ahead of the boys.
At the announcement Ted started, then, without a word of explanation, hastened to the forward coach, where he found that his talkative acquaintance was nowhere to be seen.
When informed of the facts, the conductor obtained a description of the missing man, which was telegraphed broadcast, and ere evening word was received of the fellow’s arrest, with the letter of credit intact, though he had destroyed Ted’s correspondence.
Assured that their “letter” was being forwarded to them on the train following, the boys recovered their former high spirits. The wheat fields had given way to the grazing grounds of Montana, and they beheld with interest the herds of cattle and horses, and cried out in delight at their first sight of real cowboys galloping over the range.
“Look! Look! Those must be the Rockies!” exclaimed Ted, as he caught a glimpse of a towering mass from his window toward the middle of the afternoon.
His words sent the other passengers to their windows, and they gazed with awe and wonder at the massive mountains whose summits sparkled with dazzling brilliance, in marvellous colours reflecting the sun’s rays as they danced on the snow-capped peaks.
“Now what do you think of your Eastern hills?” smiled Mr. Hopkins, turning toward Ted.
“They are more beautiful because they are entirely wooded. These are too big and brutal.”
“Perhaps you are right, anyhow you are loyal,” laughed the man. “The Rockies are certainly ‘bad medicine,’ as they say out here, to any one who gets lost on them.”
This remark evoked many stories of men who had never been seen after entering the mountains, to which the young people listened eagerly until their attention was diverted by a man and woman, both scarcely out of their teens, who boarded the car when a train stopped at a forsaken railroad junction.