ON THE TRACK.
An evening train bore Frank Merriwell into St. Joseph. He had learned of
a certainty that Hodge had purchased a ticket and taken a train for that
city, and he hoped to find Bart there, although he feared he should not.
If Bart kept on for Chicago, as he might do, there was little chance of
overtaking him.
After starting, Frank began to realize that such a blind pursuit seemed
foolish in the extreme.
His one hope was that Hodge would step off in St. Jo. If Bart did not——
Frank did not like to think of that. And still the conviction that it
was more than likely Hodge would continue his flight grew stronger and
stronger.
“Well,” muttered Merry, as he stepped off the train, “I’ll make a search
for him here. It’s the best I can do.”
He had known all along that he might have stopped Hodge by means of
telegrams to the police departments of various places through which the
fugitive must pass; but, even though Hodge had taken the money from the
grip, Frank’s soul revolted against recovering it by bringing about the
erring fellow’s arrest.
Already Bart was on the downward road—the road to ruin! Frank felt
certain of that. Was it possible to stop him—to save him? It did not
seem possible. It appeared as if Bart’s downfall were complete.
After leaving the station Frank found a policeman and asked a number of
questions. Then he proceeded to a hotel, where he registered and left
his grip. He examined the register, but Bart’s name was not there. He
scarcely expected to find it, for something told him Hodge would not
register under his own name.
Frank believed he could recognize Bart’s handwriting at a glance, no
matter what the name might be, and it was in this manner that he hoped
to trace the fugitive.
He set out on a weary round of hotels, examining the register at each
one. He could not run over the list of arrivals swiftly, for he knew it
was possible Hodge might attempt to disguise his handwriting, as well as
assume a fictitious name. This made him scrutinize each signature
closely and carefully. It was a tiresome task, but he plodded on, hoping
against hope. His nature revolted against such crude detective work, but
this did not seem to be a case at which he could work in a systematic
manner. If he found Hodge it would be a case of good fortune as much as
anything else, and he knew it.
At last he had visited all the hotels and his search had been
unrewarded.
“It’s no use!” he muttered, in disgust. “A detective would laugh at me
for trying to find a fugitive in such a manner. Yes, he would laugh at
me for thinking a chap who had just stolen more than eight hundred
dollars would stop so soon after taking to flight.
“Still, to me there seems two reasons why Hodge may have stopped here.
If he had not taken money he might not have thought it necessary to get
further away. If he did take it, he may have thought it would be easier
to stop him by means of telegrams if he continued his flight by train
than it would if he dropped off here and lost himself in this city.”
This reasoning did not give Merry much comfort. He began to realize that
he was hungry. He had not felt the need of food before, so eager had he
been to investigate the hotel registers.
Coming to what seemed like a respectable restaurant, he went in and gave
an order.
He sat down near a table at which two men were eating. He noticed that,
although they made a display of flashy jewelry, they were rather
tough-looking chaps, decidedly sporty in their dress. One of them had a
thick neck and close-cropped hair, while his face resembled that of a
bulldog. The other addressed him as “Mul,” or “Muldoon.”
It soon became evident that the other man’s name was Rafferty. He had
long, slim hands, with fingers that squirmed in a snakish manner. His
eyes were restless and watchful.
Frank had a theory that most men betray the profession they follow by
the language they use. While he was waiting for his order to be served
he unconsciously listened to the talk of the two men.
“Well, Muldoon,” said the fellow with the snaky fingers. “I’ve taken
your tip and shoved up a good wad on the sucker.”
“An’ yer all right, my boy,” asserted the owner of the bulldog face.
“Dat chap ain’t so much of a sucker as some folks take him fer. Jest
’cause he comes from Chicago dey gives him dat name.”
“You feel sure he’ll brand the Maverick?”
“Do I? Well, say, ef I had a million I’d put it on dat. If he ever lands
dat left maul on Kansas Jim’s neck der Maverick won’t know wot hit him.”
“There is no cold deck in this game, is there? It’s to be a square game
with no holdout?”
“Say, want me ter tell yer somethin’?”
“Sure.”
“Der Maverick’s up ag’in it.”
“No?”
“Dat’s straight.”
“How do you know? Won’t he have a show?”
“He’ll never do up Hanks.”
“Then he’s playing against marked cards?”
“It’s dis way: It’ll be on der level jest as long as it can be, but if
dey see Jim’s gittin’ der woist of it—well, he’ll be t’rowed down.”
“How?”
“Dunno yit.”
“How do you know so much?”
“I’m on der inside, I told yer. I can’t give erway der boys wot puts me
onter der game, but dey’ve tole me ter tip me friends off ter lay their
long green on der Sucker.”
“Well, Mul, I don’t forget this turn if the game does run my way. I’ll
see that you get a chance to go against Tommy the Terror, just as I
promised, if I rake in the chips to-night. I don’t suppose there is any
danger that the police will interfere?”
“Well, dere was danger, but I rudder t’ink der cops has been put off der
scent. Dey dunno jest when der little bout’s goin’ ter come off.”
“But they must have seen the sports coming into town to-day. Lots of
them have struck St. Jo. within the last ten hours.”
“I should guess yes! It’ll be a good t’ing fer der club.”
“I don’t believe there is any other city in the United States where this
sort of game could be played to a finish. It’s to be a regular prize
fight under pretension of having a private sparring exhibition.”
“Dat’s wot.”
“But the way the sports have come into town should be enough to tell the
police that something more than usual is to take place.”
“Aw! der perlice here are dead slow! Den dey don’t care much, anyway.
Was dere menny sports come on der train wid you, Rafferty?”
“Several. One young fellow had got onto the fight somehow, and he was
dead crazy to see it, but didn’t know how to get there. I think he had a
roll to blow, too.”
“Well, why didn’t yer give him der tip if yer t’ought he was on der
level?”
“I did. I sent him to Mike Kelley and told him Kelley would get him in.”
Frank had decided that the fellow with the bulldog face was a slugger
and prize fighter, while his companion, the owner of the squirming
fingers, was a gambler. The language of the men had revealed this
plainly enough.
“Did yer give der young duck der word?”
“Yes. I told him to say ‘upper cut’ to Kelley and shove out his fiver.”
“That was all right. Who was yer friend?”
“I didn’t get his name. He was carrying a heavy grip, with a long slip
of paper pasted on the side of it. On the paper were printed the words
‘True Blue,’ but I don’t know what that meant.”
It was impossible for Frank Merriwell to repress a start. He came near
leaping to his feet with an exclamation of satisfaction, but quickly
closed his mouth and dropped back into his seat.
“On the track at last!” he mentally exulted. “That young fellow who
seemed to have a roll to blow and who was so eager to see the prize
fight was Bart Hodge!”
Frank Merriwell was on the alert now, his ears open to catch every word
of the conversation to which up to that point he had listened with the
idlest sort of interest.
Frank wondered why he had not thought of tracing Bart by means of the
strip pasted on Hodge’s grip. In a moment, however, it seemed natural
enough that he had not thought of such a thing, for it had not seemed
probable a fellow who had just stolen over eight hundred dollars would
travel around with a conspicuous label by which he might be spotted and
recognized. It was rather remarkable that Hodge had not removed the
words in some manner from his traveling bag.
And Hodge had acted as if he had a “roll to blow!” In the midst of his
feeling of satisfaction, Frank was stricken by a sharp pain. He was glad
to be on the track of Bart, but the evidence of his former friend’s
complete depravity filled him with distress.
Hodge had taken the money, and he was bound to have a gay time while it
lasted. At least, everything seemed to indicate that.
Merry fancied that Bart had given up at last in his attempt to be honest
and upright. For a long time he had struggled against his natural
inclinations and against the unjust suspicions of others. He had grown
tired fighting fate, for it had seemed that fate was determined that he
should go wrong. No one save Frank Merriwell had shown absolute
confidence in him.
Merriwell had ever seemed to believe that Bart would turn out well in
the end, but now it appeared that his faith had been sadly at fault and
his confidence woefully misplaced.
Frank could understand how a proud, sensitive fellow like Hodge could be
driven to dishonesty by suspicion and mistrust. But there was one thing
Merry could not understand.
How had Hodge smothered his conscience and his sense of justice and
gratitude enough to permit him to rob the best and truest friend he had
ever known?
That was a puzzle to Frank. He did not like to think of it. He could not
bear to believe he had been entirely wrong in his estimate of Bart’s
character.
Somehow Frank had hoped in the face of all the evidence of Bart’s
culpability that it was not really true—that Hodge had not taken the
money.
But now it seemed there could no longer be a doubt of it. This gambler
Rafferty had fallen in with Hodge, and had given him a “tip” concerning
the proper manner to get to the prize fight that was to take place in
St. Jo.
Hodge had seemed to have a roll and he was aiming straight in the proper
direction to get rid of it. Having cut clear from Frank, it was plain he
was seeking the low and vicious.
Although a youth who could “handle his dukes” and take care of himself
in a fight, Frank Merriwell thought very little of prize fights and
prize fighters. He regarded professional pugilism as brutal, and the
“sports” who followed it up and took delight in it as a low type of
humanity. It was his belief that such affairs should be prevented by
law, and the participants in them should be severely punished by fines
and imprisonment.
Not that Frank wished the encounters stopped for the sake of the
principals, but because he believed such spectacles aroused the worst
instincts in the witnesses of them and tended to lower and degrade human
beings who saw them.
Frank knew there was not a little that was cruel in Bart Hodge, but he
had suppressed this instinct in his endeavor to model after Merry. He
was one, however, who would have no mercy on an enemy, should it happen
that that enemy fell into his power. And always had he seemed to take
great satisfaction in a square standing fight.
Merry thought of his first battle with Hodge one moonlight night in an
old pasture at Fardale. That fight had not been finished, but Frank
recalled how like a fiend the black-haired boy had struggled. Since that
time he had seen Bart in many encounters, and always Hodge had fought
with the same terrible fierceness, as if he was burning with a desire to
kill his antagonist.
Such a fellow would take pleasure in witnessing a bloody and brutal
prize fight—a fight to a finish.
Somehow Frank’s sympathy for Hodge lessened. Had Bart taken the money
because he was in need of it, had he taken it to pay debts, had he taken
it with the hope of going somewhere and starting in business for
himself, then Frank could have been more lenient. But for Hodge to seem
to hasten with the stolen money straight to the companionship of
“sports,” gamblers, prize fighters and men of that order—it was too
much!
“These men must not get away,” thought Frank. “I must follow them. I
must find out where this fight is to take place and I must get into it.”
The waiter brought his order.
“If I could find this man Kelley of whom they were speaking,” thought
Merry. “I know how to get there through him. Five dollars and the
password, ‘upper cut,’ would do the trick.”
He began to eat in haste, for he heard Muldoon remark:
“We’d better be hustling, Rafferty. Der game will open at ten o’clock.”
“I’ll be ready to go in a minute,” said the gambler. “Here, waiter,
what’s the check?”
Frank was very hungry, but he would have left his food untouched rather
than to lose sight of them then. He bolted down a few mouthfuls and
drank the cup of coffee he had ordered.
By that time Muldoon and Rafferty had risen and were preparing to go.
Frank called the waiter the moment the two men started for the door.
“Check—quick!” he exclaimed. “Got to catch a train. Didn’t know it was
so late.”
The waiter gave him his check and he paid it in a hurry, flinging down a
quarter extra, and, grabbing his hat, bolted for the door.
Out on the street he was relieved to see Rafferty and Muldoon a short
distance away, walking rapidly.
Frank followed them.
“I rather think you will lead me straight to Hodge,” he thought,
exultantly. “If this was not a piece of luck! And it came just when I
seemed wholly off the scent.”
Neither of the men seemed to imagine they were followed, and so Frank
had no trouble in shadowing them.
At length the men turned into a side street. There it was somewhat more
difficult to keep track of them, but Merry shadowed them without seeming
to be doing anything of the sort. He kept track of all their twists and
turns, unfamiliar with the city, though he was, and, at last, he saw
them enter a saloon by a side door.
Frank was not far behind them. He noticed that others were flocking into
that saloon by the same side entrance.
Inside, the saloon was packed. Men were smoking, drinking, swearing and
exchanging sporting talk. Most of them were loudly dressed, and the
saloon lights glinted on many huge diamonds, of which there was a
decidedly vulgar display. A good number of the men were of the
thick-necked, beefy sort.
It was such a saloon as Frank would regard as a “beer joint,” but beer
was not the beverage there that night. It was either whisky, champagne,
or nothing—and where was the man who was taking nothing?
“Kansas Jim will win in a walk.”
“Go on, you bluffer! He ain’t in it with the Sucker!”
“Hanks won’t last three rounds.”
“What have you got that says so besides your mouth?”
“I’ve got good horse sense.”
“But no rino. Back your talk—back it up!”
“Where’s your money?”
“Here—right here.”
The speaker flourished a “roll.”
This talk did not seem to attract much attention, for everybody seemed
talking in a similar manner. One man was pounding on the bar. He had a
huge red nose and a diamond in his shirt bosom that was as large as an
acorn.
“I’m Ned Carter of Kansas City!” he cried. “I reckon you gents know me!
If any of you has money to throw away just back the Maverick. That steer
will get branded deep to-night.”
“And I’m Col. McGraw of Topeka!” roared a tall man, who wore a slouch
hat thrust far back on his head, and whose drooping mustache and long
imperial were iron-gray. “I don’t give a dern whether you gents know me
or not; but I’ll bet a cool thousand even that the Maverick will put the
Sucker to sleep inside of fifteen rounds if he’s given a square deal.”
“Where’s your long green?”
“Money talks!”
“Put up, colonel!”
“Or shut up, colonel.”
“Oh, I’m here to back my talk,” declared the Topeka man, fishing into an
inside pocket. “Here’s the—— Well, I’m blowed!”
“What’s the matter?”
“I’ve been touched! Gents, I’ve been robbed of five thousand dollars I
took to back the Maverick!”
“Ha! ha! ha!” roared the crowd. “Colonel, it won’t go! You are a
squealer!”
To this the Topeka man roared a vigorous protest, but his words were
drowned.
Frank’s breath was almost taken away.
“Well, this beats!” he gasped. “It must be the police of this city are
dead slow, or else they are standing in with the parties who are running
this fight. If they were not, they’d be dead certain to catch on.”
He looked around for Rafferty and Muldoon, but could see nothing of
them.
“I’m certain they came in here,” he muttered. “They must be somewhere in
this crowd.” He moved about to find them, being obliged to crowd his way
about.
“Hi, there, young feller! ye’re treadin’ on my toes!”
“I beg your pardon,” said Frank, as politely as he could.
“Waal, ye’d better!” growled the big man, glaring at him. “What’re you
in here fer, anyhow? Ye’re nothin’ but a boy. This ain’t no place fer
you.”
Frank attempted to move away, but the arm of the man shot out, and Merry
was collared.
“You go home to your mammy, youngster,” advised the fellow, starting to
drag Frank to the door.
“Toss him out, McGinty!”
“Give him the bounce, slugger!”
“Spank the mother’s boy and send him home.”
“Does his mother know he’s out?”
The door was reached, and the big fellow started to swing Frank round to
get a better hold of him. At that moment Merry broke away with a sudden
twist and yank, caught the surprised ruffian behind, gave him a strong
shove, and planted his foot with all his strength under the tail of the
man’s coat.
McGinty, the slugger, was fairly lifted by that kick and sent spinning
through the swinging doors, which opened before him and closed behind
him.