Suddenly from beneath Marjory’s feet there sounded a queer chatter. Then something clawed at her legs. With a wild scream, she shook it from her. It was a monkey that had escaped from his broken cage. Others could be heard chattering to the right of them. Leaping forward they were startled by a great bulk that loomed unexpectedly before them in the dark.
“An elephant!” screamed Margaret.
For a minute they hesitated; the next, they leaped to one side and, having passed the elephant, continued on down the track. Always to the left of them there loomed the overturned cars. All at once, from beneath the wheels of one of these there came a piercing scream. At the same instant they caught the gleam of two red balls of fire glaring at them out of the blackness. Some fierce, wild creature was lurking there. And he moved. Stealthily he made his way toward them. Now he was away from the cars. A black spot, he glided forward, his glaring eyes seeming to grow larger and larger as he advanced.
Seized with a sudden paralysis of fear, the twins stood rooted in their tracks.
* * * * * * * *
With a little gasp Gwen sank upon the ground. She looked in vain for the crimson flash. It was gone. And now, for the first time she realized that she did not know the direction whence it had come.
After leaving Gwen, Johnny Thompson made his way cautiously along the uneven embankment. Now his eye caught a gleam that appeared to come from the great cat’s eyes. It proved but the reflection of some polished object. Again he heard a rattle among splintered boards, only to find a colored roustabout climbing from the pile of broken lumber under which he had been buried. Johnny was just beginning to believe that he had missed both the black beast and the twins when something leaped at him out of the darkness.
It took him but a second to realize that this was not a wild beast, but a man; the king of the counterfeiters.
Taken by surprise, he went down with the man upon his back. At the same instant he caught the gleam of a knife in the outlaw’s hand. There could be not one shadow of doubt that he meant murder.
A terrible struggle followed. The man, fully fifty pounds heavier than Johnny, was at the same time agile and strong. Now the knife was poised in air, only to be dashed to the ground. Now Johnny secured a half-nelson. Now his hold was broken. And now Johnny was thrown to earth with such force as to render him half unconscious. Struggling against a terrible dizziness, he fought but feebly. The end seemed to have come.