The same night also, by some unexplained means, Otis Clymer and his associate Coffey, made their escape from the Trinity jail, and all efforts of the authorities of the town failed to recapture them or discover a clue to the direction they had taken in their flight.
It was certainly too bad, for these men at large were a dangerous menace to the interests of the young owners of the Pandora copper mine.
CHAPTER XVII.
A COPPER HARVEST.
Ten days after the death of Gideon Prawle Jack Howard stood in the freight yard of the Montana Central Railroad and watched car 999, with its way-bill, which contained specifications of the contents and destination of the car, attached in plain sight, being pushed into place at the tail end of an eastbound freight train then being made up to leave the yard at seven that evening.
Jack was interested in that particular car because it contained his smelted copper, now ready for market.
He intended to take a passenger train himself at eight for New York.
While he was standing a little distance away between the tracks another long train, made up of empties, backed down and shut out from his view the particular train to which car 999 was attached.
It was some minutes before the empties passed down the line, but when they did Jack saw the man who had been pointed out to him as the conductor of the seven o’clock eastbound freight, in company with two other men, one of whom carried one of his arms in a sling, standing in front of car 999, talking earnestly.
This circumstance would not have impressed the boy in the least but for the fact that the men made occasional gestures toward the car which contained the copper; and this circumstance struck him as suspicious, coupled as it was with the knowledge that Otis Clymer and his confederate Coffey were at large, and that it was by no means improbable but they still entertained designs against the interests of the owners of the Pandora mines.