edge were a blind! Mr. Dodge has his own reasons for wanting
people to think him dead. He has sloped away. Here's the track.
Which way did he and the fellows go?"

"Away from Gridley," declared Darrin, sagely. "Otherwise, Mr.
Dodge would have been seen by some one who would remember him."

"We'll go up along the track, then."

This they did, but the roadbed was hard. Besides, anyone walking
on the ties would leave no trail. It was slow work, holding the
lantern close to the ground and scanning every step, besides swinging
the lantern out to light up either side of their course. Yet
both lads were so tremendously interested that they pushed on,
heedless of the flight of time.

They had gone a mile or more up the track, "inching" it along,
when they came upon an unmistakable print of Mr. Dodge's oddly
pointed boot and narrow, high heel. They found, too, the print
of a brogan within six feet of the same point.

"This is the way Dodge and his queer companions came," exulted
Dave.

"But I don't believe they followed the track much further," argued
Prescott, pointing ahead at the signal lights of a small crossing
station. "If Mr. Dodge were trying to get away from public gaze
he wouldn't go by a station where usually half a dozen loungers
are smoking and talking with the station agent."