The Monticellonian., 1915-09-16

of steel and managed to get his fin gers about the chauffeur's throat as an added insurance against cry fol help.
 He choked him literally into insensi. bility. Then. with a strength that he did not seem to possess. he picked up the limp. blue-faced body and carried it off the road and around the car. |
 In the baggage car, the baggage man was smoking a surreptitious pipe of powerful tobacco between stations and contemplating the scenery thoughtfully through the open door.
 As the engine slowed up to take a curve and a grade, Bailey, who had now and then taken peep out of a little grated window above him, crept out from his hiding place. Already he had slipped dark silk mask over his | face.
 As he made his way among the | trunks and boxes, the train lurched and the baggage man, who had his back to Bailey, heard him catch himself. He turned and leaped to his feet. Bailey closed with him instantly.
 Over and over they rolled. Bailey had already drawn his revolver before he left his hiding place. A shot, how ever, would have been fatal to his part in the plans and was only last resort, | for it would have brought the train men.
 Finally Bailey rolled his man over and getting his right arm free, dealt the baggage man a fierce blow with the butt of the gun.
 The train was now pulling slowly up the grade. More time had been spent in overcoming the baggage man than he expected and Bailey had to work quickly. He dragged the trunk marked "E Dodge" from the pile to the door and glanced out.
 Just around the curve in the rail road Del Mar was waiting, straining his eyes down the track. There was the train, puffing up the grade As it approached he rose and waved his arms. It was the signal and he waited anxiously. Had his plans been carried out?
 The train passed. From the baggage car came a trunk catapulted out by strong arm It hurled through the air and landed with it's own and the trains momentum.
 Over it rolled in the bushes then stopped-unbroken for Elaine bad had it designed to resist even the most violent baggage smasher
 Del Mar ran to it. As the tail light of the train disappeared he turned around in the direction from which he had come. placed his two hands to his mouth and shouted.
  From the side of the road by Del Mars car the bearded motorcyclist had just emerged. buttoning the chauf- feur's clothes and adjusting his gog- gles 10 his own face.
 As he approached the car, he heard a shout. Quickly he tore off the black beard which had been his disguise and tossed it into the grass. Then he drew the coat high up about his neck.
 All right" he shouted back, start ing along the road. Together he apd Del Mar managed to scramble up the embankment to the road and one at each handle of the trunk, they carried it back to the car, piling it in the back.
 The improvised chauffeur started to take his place at the wheel and Del Mar had his foot on the running board to get beside him, when the now un- bearded stranger suddenly swung about and struck Del Mar full in the face. It sent him reeling back into the dust
 The engine of the car had been run ming and before Del Mar could recover consciousness the stranger had shot the car ahead. leaving Del Mar prone in the roadway.
 The train, with Bailey on it, had not gained much speed, yet it was peril ous undertaking to leap. Still, it was more so now to remain, The baggage man stirred It was now a case of murder or a getaway.
 Bailey jumped.
 Scratched and bruised and shaken. he scrambled to his feet in the briers along the track. He staggered up the road, pulled himself together, then hurried back as fast as his parked shins would let him.
 He came to the spot which he recog nized as that where he had thrown off the trunk He saw the tramped and broken bushes and made for the road. He had not gone far when he saw, far down, Del Mar suddenly attacked and thrown down, apparently by his own chauffeur. Bailey ran forward, but it was too late. The car was gone. As he came up to Del Mar lying out stretched in the road, Del Mar was just recovering consciousness.
 What was the matter?" he asked. Was he traitor?"
 He caught sight of the real chauf- feur on the ground, stripped. Del Mar was furious. No" he swore, it was that confounded gray friar again. l think. And he has the trunk, tool"
 
 Speeding up the road the former masquerader and motorcyclist stopped at last.
 Eagerly he leaped out of Del Mars