“All right,” said Coffey, “we’re going down on the eight o’clock passenger which stops at Phalanx, a mile this side of Benson’s.”
The two schemers then crossed over to the end of the freight sheds and disappeared.
“So, those scoundrels have arranged to steal my car of ore,” said Jack to himself, as he walked slowly back the way he had come. “And I’ll bet it’s not entirely for the value of the stuff they’re doing this either. They’ve a deeper game. They think now that the mine is in possession of mere boys that the loss of this carload of pure copper may ruin and discourage us, and that, through their agents, they stand a good chance of buying in the mining property cheap. I fancy they’ll find they’re up against a different kind of proposition. It’s up to me to prepare a surprise for those chaps at Benson’s Crossing, and I guess I haven’t any time to lose if I’m going to do it.”
Jack Howard hoofed it in short order to the office of the division superintendent and had an interview with that official.
That gentleman was incredulous at first.
“What, steal a freight car!” he exclaimed, amazedly. “Impossible! Nobody could work a scheme like that on our line and get away with it.”
But Jack succeeded in convincing him that there really was a piece of villainy on foot, and the superintendent, after considering the matter, agreed to fall in with the plan proposed by the boy to defeat it.
At a few minutes after ten that night the eastbound passenger stopped as per schedule at Phalanx.
The only passengers to alight on the platform were the disguised Clymer and his companion in iniquity, Coffey.
On the other side, however, Jack Howard, the division superintendent, and three officers of the Marysville police force, stepped off into the darkness and started at once through the gloom for Benson’s, where they duly arrived and concealed themselves close to the siding.