Matt was thoughtful for a few moments. Stepping to the window overlooking the parade ground, he peered out at the weather. The rain continued to come down in torrents, but there was a hint, overhead, that the storm would not last out the night.
"We have a good clue to Murgatroyd's whereabouts," said Matt presently, coming back and taking a chair facing his friends, "but there are several points to be considered. Prebbles sent on the original of his son's letter last night. That means that some time to-day Murgatroyd got the letter in Bismarck. If it is raining as hard, over on the Missouri, as it is here, it is unlikely that Murgatroyd went up the river to Burnt Creek to-day. With clearing weather, he'll probably go up to-morrow."
"Then," said Cameron, "it's our business to take a train for Jamestown at once, connect with a west-bound train there for Bismarck, and then take a team and drive from Bismarck to Burnt Creek."
"The afternoon train has left Minnewaukon," answered Matt, who seemed to have considered every phase of the matter, "and there is no other train south until to-morrow morning. That train, I think, connects with one on the main line for Bismarck, but we could hardly reach the town before late to-morrow afternoon, and it would be night before we could get to Burnt Creek. While we were losing all this time, what will Murgatroyd be doing?"
"Why not get an automobile from Devil's Lake City," suggested Cameron, "and reach Jamestown in time to connect with an earlier train?"
"How will the roads be after this rain?" inquired Matt.
"That's so!" exclaimed Cameron, with a gloomy look from one of the windows. "These North Dakota roads are fine in dry weather, but they're little more than bogs after a rain like this. We can't use the automobile, that's sure, and Murgatroyd is likely to reach Burnt Creek before we can possibly get there. Will he and young Prebbles stay at Burnt Creek until we arrive? That's the point."
"It's so uncertain a point," said Matt, "that we can't take chances with it."
"We've got to take chances, pard," put in McGlory, "unless we charter an engine for the run to Jamestown."