There was a cold northeaster blowing, and it was spitting snow as I went
back to the docks to see if I could get a boat for Milwaukee. A steamer
in the offing was getting ready to go, and I hired a man with a skiff
to put me and my carpet-bag aboard. We went into Milwaukee in a howling
blizzard, and I was glad to find a warm bar in the tavern nearest the
dock; and a room in which to house up while I carried on my search. I
now had found out that the stage lines and real-estate offices were the
best places to go for traces of immigrants; and I haunted these places
for a month before I got a single clue to Rucker's movements. It almost
seemed that he had been hiding in Milwaukee, or had slipped through so
quickly as not to have made himself remembered--which was rather odd,
for there was something about his tall stooped figure, his sandy beard,
his rather whining and fluent talk, and his effort everywhere to get
himself into the good graces of every one he met that made it easy to
identify him. His name, too, was one that seemed to stick in
people's minds.



5

At last I found a man who freighted and drove stage between Milwaukee
and Madison, who remembered Rucker; and had given him passage to Madison
sometime, as he remembered it, in May or June--or it might have been
July, but it was certainly before the Fourth o£ July.

"You hauled him--and his wife?" I asked.

"Him and his wife," said the man, "and a daughter."