"Scattered to the Winds."
The sun stood high in the heavens when Joe awakened, and it was some
moments before he remembered the horrible occurrences of the preceding
night. But most vividly of all he remembered the solemn promise he had
made to his dying pal and to strengthen himself in his resolve to
strictly live up to his pledge, he fell upon his knees and repeated the
solemn oath.
At a rippling brook he washed and removed every trace of the ordeal he
had passed through, and then inquired from a farmer the direction to the
railroad station at Dixon, where he intended to hop a train to Chicago
and, arriving in the city, find a job so he could support himself
honestly, while keeping on a lookout for his missing brother Jim.
After an hour's walk he arrived at the railroad station and found a
crowd surging about a baggage truck which stood upon the station
platform, and when he managed to push his way through the throng he
found that the people were staring at a blood soaked blanket that
covered a carcass of some sort. Joe only stopped for a moment, for when
one of the men, more curious than the others, lifted up a corner of the
blanket, Joe gazed into the lifeless features of Slippery, the yegg, and
forced by his emotions he retreated quickly to another part of the
platform.
Here he overheard some of the citizens discussing the post office
robbery, and he heard them say that the railroad and city policemen had
identified the dead robber as one of the most dangerous criminals in the
land for whose apprehension "dead or alive", the government offered a
large reward. He also heard that the same country store post office had
been dynamited twice in the past three months, and that the postmaster
had set a trap with the aid of his neighbors, to give the next gang of
burgling yeggs a hot reception.
Presently a loud shout was heard and the crowd made a rush to the front
of the station. Joe followed and saw a dirt covered man, securely
manacled to an officer, entering the waiting room. Joe instantly
recognized Boston Frank, and heard that he had been caught by a farmer's
posse, who, following a trail of blood that had dripped from the buggy,
had surprised Boston Frank while he was busy at work burying the
satchels containing the burglar tools.
Joe caught Boston Frank's eye and forthwith pushed himself alongside the
yegg. While the officer to whom he was manacled paid close attention to
the postmaster, who told him that although yeggs had spoiled his safe
for a third time, he had protected his own and the government's
valuables by having placed a quart bottle of formaldehyde in the safe,
Boston Frank contrived to whisper to Joe that he had Slippery's purse in
his hip pocket, and for him to take it and keep its contents, as he
himself would have little use for cash in the penitentiary, for a long
term now stared him in the face, and he ordered Joe to purchase a ticket
and take the first train leaving for Chicago and to warn the others, as
the officers, while searching him had found an incriminating letter that
bore upon its envelope the correct address of the gang's hangout.
Joe did as Boston Frank had directed, and a moment later he had,
unobserved, abstracted a well-filled purse from the latter's pocket and
hid it in his own. He then made his way to the ticket window and called
for a ticket to Chicago. When he pulled out the purse that Boston Frank
had told him belonged to the slain criminal, he almost dropped it from
sheer surprise, as he instantly recognized it as his own purse, the very
one that had been stolen from him at the Golden Rule Hotel, and the loss
of which had started all of his misfortunes. He paid for the ticket and
then in a secluded spot he counted the contents of the purse, which
proved to be a windfall to the penniless lad, as it amounted to twelve
dollars.
While he waited for the arrival of the train, marvel as he might, he
could not solve the riddle connected with the strange return of his
purse that had so mysteriously managed to come back to its rightful
owner after having disappeared at a place five hundred miles removed
from Dixon, Illinois.
He rode to Chicago on the same train upon which the government officers
were bringing the corpse of the slain robber, and while Boston Frank was
chained to a seat in the smoking car, Joe sat silently in the
first-class coach, thinking of the lucky escape he had had and ever and
anon repeating the oath he had made to the now lifeless clay in the
baggage car ahead.
While Joe was thus occupied he must have attracted the attention of one
of the train men, who good-naturedly stopped to chat with him, and
inquired where he was going. Joe told him that Chicago was his
destination, and innocently added that he intended to find employment in
the city. "Say, kid," the good-natured brakeman advised him, more as a
huge joke than in a serious vein, "if you cannot find anything better,
hit my boss for a job." And then he gave Joe the correct address of his
superior.
When the train arrived at the Chicago terminal, Joe boarded a street car
that brought him quickly to the flat where he intended to acquaint its
inmates with the misfortune that had overtaken Slippery and Boston
Frank, and also to deliver the verbal message the latter had given him.
To his surprise he found the front of the house in which the flat was
located kept clear of public traffic by a cordon of policemen, while
several police patrols were backed against the curb, and were not only
loaded with the handcuffed criminals, who had been caught like rats in a
trap, upon the telegraphic advice of the Dixon police authorities, but
with thousands of dollars worth of stolen property that had been found
in trunks and other hiding places.
While Joe stood in the crowd watching the finish of those who had
transgressed the law, with far better reasons than the curious idlers
about him could suspect, he felt someone sharply pull his coat sleeve.
He felt himself turning ashen-gray from fright as he thought some
detective had recognized him, and when the same sharp pull was repeated,
trembling with fear, he turned to see who it was that knew him in
Chicago, and recognized that his dread was groundless as it was "Babe"
who had pulled his sleeve, the youngest girl in the den of the thieves,
who luckily happened to be away from home when the police commenced the
raid of the flat.
[Illustration: Her emotions got the better of her and she placed her
arms around the sobbing lad's neck and kissed him.]
"Come, Joe," she whispered, "I want to speak to you." He followed the
girl and both walked to the nearby shore of Lake Michigan, where he
repeated to her word for word everything that had occurred since he last
saw her at the flat, and when he remarked that both of them should thank
a kind Providence that had kept them out of the hands of the police,
tears trickled down their cheeks, while they gazed out over the restless
waters of the lake.
It was "Babe" who broke the silence by remarking: "We are indeed lucky,
Joe. Just think of what would have been our fate had we been arrested
with the others. You would have been sent to a penal institution to
emerge years later an ex-convict, a marked man forever afterwards, while
I would have been sent to a home where I would have been forced to
associate with the most degraded wretches. I was only seventeen last
month and was sent from a faraway western city to a boarding school in
the east, where the "blue stocking" matrons made the unfettered life
that I had learned to love at home such a misery for me, that I ran away
and came to Chicago to seek employment. I fell in with evil company,
but, thank God, I have yet enough common sense left to know when to
quit, and that is right now. For obvious reasons, I am not going to tell
you my address, but," here she turned and out of a hiding place in her
dress pulled a fair-sized roll of greenbacks, and then she continued, "I
have managed to look out for a day just like this one and have saved a
few dollars so I could get back home in the west, and" now she peeled a
hundred dollar bill from the roll she held in her hand, "I want you to
accept this sum and forget that you ever met me." Here her emotions got
the best of her and she put her arms around Joe's neck, who was sobbing,
being unable to express in any other manner his appreciation of the
girl's generosity, and after she had kissed the boy she whispered: "Joe,
for the sake of your mother I want you to swear that you will never
again become a companion of criminals." Joe repeated to her the same
solemn oath he had pledged to the dying Slippery, and promised that he
would faithfully adhere to it as long as he lived. When he finished, for
the want of something better to give her as a souvenir, he emptied the
purse that had so strangely come back to him and made the girl accept it
as a token of his gratitude for her timely help, when a mere dozen
dollars stood between him and temptation.
After making Joe promise that he would not attempt to follow her, she
bade him farewell and walked to the nearest street crossing, and while
Joe was busy wiping his eyes with one of his hands, he waved her
farewell with the other until she mounted a street car and was whirled
beyond his vision.
After Joe had furnished himself with a proper outfit of clothing, and
all the other things required by a young man who intends to find a
respectable position, he engaged a room at a first-class hotel. He ate
his supper in company with honest people and later retired for the
night. He turned off the light, and while he lay there between the
sheets waiting for sleep to overtake him, the fearful experiences of the
last two days followed one another through his agitated mind just as if
they were moving pictures. When he came to the scene where he knelt by
the side of the flying yegg and solemnly swore to forever quit the path
Slippery had shown him, he felt a strange power drag him out of the bed,
force him to kneel upon the floor and repeat the sacred promise to shun
Bums, Booze and Boxcars and then, when he went again to bed, it was only
a few moments until he was soundly sleeping.