capture of the criminal. The Rovers joined in the hunt for the best
part of an hour, but without success.

"It's worse than looking for a pin in a haystack," grumbled Tom,
presently. "We might as well give it up."

"Let us walk around the town and see if we can learn anything,"
suggested his big brother.

They walked down the main street of Plankville from end to end,
questioning several people they knew. At last they got word that a
mysterious automobile had passed through the town about midnight of
the day Josiah Crabtree had broken from jail. But who had been in the
touring car nobody could tell.

"He may have escaped in that," declared Dick.

"And if he did, that man who came to see him at the jail had the car,"
added Sam.

"Just what I think," cried Tom. "Well, if he got away in an auto there
is no use of our looking for him here," he added, with a sigh.

Nevertheless, the boys hung around Plankville for an hour longer. Then
they got aboard of the Dartaway, and with Tom at the wheel, and Dick
with a pair of field glasses to his eyes, swung in several circles
about the neighborhood.

"No use," declared the oldest Rover boy, at last. "It is getting late.
We might as well return to college. We can do nothing here."