Dyke Darrel the Railroad Detective Part 35

THE SEAT WAS EMPTY!

He had left Nell Darrel there not more than twenty minutes since, drugged into complete insensibility. She could not have gone from the seat of her own volition.

An indefinable thrill of fear stole over the stalwart frame of Professor Darlington Ruggles. He glanced up and down the car; the girl was not in sight. But one person was awake, an old man, who said:

"Lookin' fur the young lady?"

The Professor nodded.

"She got off't last station." "Got off? How--"

"She had help, of course," explained the old pa.s.senger, quickly.

"Who helped her?" cried Ruggles, in a husky voice.

"An old woman, who got on and off at the last station quick's wink."

CHAPTER XXIII.

d.y.k.e DARREL ON THE TRAIL.

The men who burst into Aunt Scarlet's room on the night that Professor Ruggles departed from the block with Nell Darrel in his arms, were men of determination and friends of the detective, who had gone into the building in the disguise of an old man, for the purpose of investigating.

How the investigation came out the reader has been already informed.

The report of pistols had warned Harry Bernard, the boy Paul Ender, and two officers in their company, that something of an interesting nature was going on in the bas.e.m.e.nt of the Scarlet block.

"d.y.k.e is in difficulty, that is sure," cried Harry, in an excited voice. "We must get inside at once."

They tried the side door, to find it locked. It was through this door that they had seen the bold detective disappear, and it was in the same direction that the four men proposed to go in search of their daring friend.

The room was in darkness, but Paul soon had the rays of a dark lantern flashing about the place.

"Let us move with caution," said Harry, taking the lead, and entering the hall through the doorway which Ruggles, in his hasty flight, had left open. Soon voices greeted them from the bas.e.m.e.nt, and a light glimmered through a half-open door at the head of the stairs.

"If we could only put him under down here," said a voice, which the reader will recognize as that of Nick Brower, the villainous accomplice of Professor Ruggles from the opening of our story.

"Wal, I reckin we kin," said the villainous companion of Brower. As he spoke, he went to the side of the fallen man-hunter, and placed the point of a knife against his throat.

"What now, pard?

"Dead men tell no tales, Nick."

"True. Send it home---"

SPANG!

The sharp report of a revolver wake the echoes once more. The knife dropped from the nerveless grasp of the would-be a.s.sa.s.sin, and with a howl of pain he began dancing an Irish jig on the stone floor of the cellar.

Nick Brower whirled instantly, s.n.a.t.c.hed a revolver from his hip, to find that four glittering bulldogs confronted him from the stairs.

"Drop that weapon, or we will drop you!" thundered Harry Bernard in a stern voice.

"Trapped!" cried Brower, in a despairing voice.

Then the four men moved down into the cellar and secured Brower and his companion.

"We have made a good haul," said one of the police officers who accompanied Bernard and Paul, who recognized in Brower an old offender.

Harry Bernard bent quickly and anxiously over the prostrate detective.

"My soul!" uttered the young man, "the villains have killed poor Darrel, I do believe."

But the young man's belief was unfounded, since some time later d.y.k.e Darrel came to his senses. He was in a bad condition, however, and those who saw him predicted that the detective had followed his last trail. A search of the building brought to light Madge Scarlet, who was fuming angrily over her imprisonment.

"How did this happen?" demanded Bernard, sternly, when he came to question the hag. She was sullen, however, and refused to answer.

"I imagine there is a way to bring your tongue into working order,"

said Bernard, in a stern voice.

"I keep a respectable house, sir; you can't harm me."

"We'll see about that."

"Did you find any one?" questioned the jezabel in an apparently careless tone.

"We have two of your friends in limbo," returned Harry. "You will find it no holiday affair to keep a house for the purpose of murder and robbery. Never mind, you need say nothing, for it will not better matters in the least. Come;" and Harry Bernard led the old woman from the cellar.

A patrol wagon bore the prisoners to the lock-up, and Bernard had d.y.k.e Darrel taken to a private hospital, where he could have the best of care. It was some days, however, before the badly battered detective came to his senses sufficiently to converse on the subject of the racket in the building on Clark street.

"My soul! Harry, has nothing been discovered of poor Nell?--was she killed?" questioned the wounded man in a voice wrung with anguish.

"I don't think Nell was mortally hurt," returned Bernard in a rea.s.suring tone, although he hardly felt hopeful himself. "If she was, why should the villains have taken her away, or the villain rather, since, from your account, I judge that but one of them escaped, and he the man with the red hair."

"Yes, he seemed the chief scoundrel among them. I heard him called Professor Ruggles."

"He is about as much a professor as I am," answered Bernard.

"HE is the man we want for that midnight crime on the express train. I have evidence enough now, d.y.k.e, to prove that this man is the guilty princ.i.p.al, and I also believe that one of his accomplices is now in prison."

"Indeed!"

And then the detective groaned in anguish of spirit and of body. It was hard to lay here, helpless as a child, while the fate of Nell was uncertain, and there was so much need for a keen detective to be afloat. Harry realized how his friend suffered, and soothed him as best he could. "Leave no stone unturned to find her, Harry," urged the detective. "If you do find and save her, great shall be your reward.

If she is dead, then I will see about avenging the deed."