ROBBERS LEAVE A TRAIL

The Overland Riders looked at Grace, then at the colonel, not understanding. Colonel Scott first introduced Grace to his companions.

“This young woman with an assistant was transporting wounded men from a base hospital to Paris,” said the colonel. “Their train was wrecked and the men were suffering in a cold railroad station to which Mrs. Gray had had them removed. They were without food, and the line was blocked for fifty miles ahead. She wired me for relief for the wounded men. Of course I couldn’t give it and so wired her. Then I got a sizzling message from her, saying that she was about to complain to the commanding officer of the American forces.”

“And she did, eh?” chuckled one of the colonel’s companions.

“I’ll say she did. That was not all. Less than half an hour later I received another message, this time from the commanding general, assuring me that if I could not handle the transportation of the Northern he would appoint a man who could.” The colonel laughed heartily, and his friends regarded Grace’s flushed face with new interest.

“I apologize,” said Grace. “It was not a graceful thing to do, but I think you will admit that my action on that occasion was justified.”

“You got results, didn’t you?” demanded Colonel Scott with some brusqueness.

“Oh, yes, sir.”

“And I got a calling-down—two of them, first by wire, then by letter from headquarters, and I said to myself, ‘I hope I meet that young woman one day, and when I do I shall have something to say to her.’”

“Now is your opportunity,” reminded Grace. “What is it that you wish to say?”

“Just this, Mrs. Gray—that, were you a man, I should make you a division superintendent on my railroad whether or not you had ever seen a railroad,” answered the colonel amid laughter.

“Suppose we go in and have dinner,” suggested Grace. “Miss Briggs was my assistant on the occasion to which you refer. I suppose the criticism applies equally to her.”

“I had nothing to do with it,” protested J. Elfreda. “Mrs. Gray has a habit of going ahead and doing things, asking advice afterwards,” retorted Elfreda, as the party started for the hotel dining room.

The Overlanders were the center of attraction and many an amused smile from the diners was directed at Stacy Brown, but Stacy did not appear to observe their glances. He was pleased, however, that the diners were impressed with him despite the strip of black court plaster that now decorated the bridge of his nose. Hence the excuse for the fat boy to throw back his shoulders and tilt the damaged nose up a few degrees.

Stacy ate his dinner gravely, controlling his appetite very well. In fact, his table manners were something of a pleasant surprise to his companions, who had feared that the lad’s appetite might outdistance his breeding, as was not infrequently the case in camp.

After dinner the Overland party returned to the veranda where they were joined by Colonel Scott, and reminiscences of the great war were indulged in, to which there were many listeners.

After they had chatted for a time, Hippy excused himself to go back to the camp to repair his saddle. When he reached there the campfire was burning low and Jim Badger was nowhere to be seen. Hippy did not give the guide’s absence any special thought at the moment, though Badger should have remained there, instead of leaving the camp unprotected at night.

After replenishing the fire, Lieutenant Wingate began working on his saddle, the lining of which had that day been torn loose. He had been at his task for about an hour when Badger came in.

“Hey there, Jim! Why did you leave the camp unprotected?” demanded Hippy sharply.

The guide’s face flushed.

“I was chasin’ some bears that had been nosin’ ’bout the place.”

“From the camp?”

“Yes. They was tryin’ to git at our chuck.”

“Oh, all right. It’s a pity that we can’t take a shot at those fellows,” declared Hippy.

“Mebby you’ll git a chance when we git in the northeastern end-of the Park,” suggested the guide with a sly wink.

“Not a single little thing doing in that direction, Buddy. Don’t you make any such proposal to this outfit unless you want to get your walking papers,” warned Lieutenant Wingate.

“This outfit is mighty particular, ain’t it, eh?”

“It is.”

“Well, I reckon that’s right. I was only jokin’ anyway.”

Hippy made no reply, but continued with his work, observed appraisingly by the guide, who seemed much interested.

In the meantime another and more exciting scene was being enacted at the hotel, where the rest of the Overland party had been enjoying a delightful evening with Colonel Scott and his friends. Tom Gray had just been telling the colonel of the mysterious loss of the Overland ponies, and how the railroad president had promised to put forth efforts looking to the recovery of the missing horses, when an interruption came. The wife of one of Colonel Scott’s friends came running to the front of the house in search of her husband.

“I’ve been robbed!” she cried, in answer to a volley of questions.

“Robbed?” demanded a chorus of voices.

“Yes. When I came down to dinner I left my jewels on the bureau in my room. My purse, with a sum of money in it, was there also. That, too, is gone.”

“Where is your room?” asked Tom Gray.

“At the rear of the house on the second floor, sir. Please, won’t someone do something?”

“I should advise you to notify the hotel proprietor and leave the matter in his charge,” suggested Grace. “Pardon me, but please give me the exact location of your room.”

The woman did so in a few words. Colonel Scott said Grace’s advice was good and suggested that the woman and her husband go at once to their room.

“I will send the proprietor to you,” he continued. “You know we do not wish to create a sensation here.”

“I know. But, Colonel, that is not getting my jewels back,” protested the woman.

Colonel Scott motioned to the woman’s husband to take her away, after which the colonel went into the hotel to look for the proprietor. Stacy Brown strolled in after the couple. The fat boy went on upstairs keeping at a discreet distance behind the woman and her husband, and saw them enter their room. Adjoining it was a short hall leading off from the main corridor, and as Chunky reached it he leaned out of one of the open windows inhaling a long breath of the cool mountain air. Below him he saw the red roof of the rear veranda, but that was all.

By the time he had finished his inspection and turned away, the proprietor was hurrying to the scene of the robbery. He bumped into Stacy at the junction of the corridor and the short hall.

“Who are you?” demanded the proprietor suspiciously.

“Name’s Brown. What’s yours?” returned the boy.

“I am the proprietor of this house.”

“And I am one of the unfortunate fellows who have had to stand for a few of its meals,” answered the Overlander, thrusting both hands in his pockets and strolling towards the stairway.

“Where were you? We have been waiting for you,” questioned Tom Gray as Stacy returned.

“Just looking over the premises for clews, that’s all,” was the reply.

“Well, did you discover anything?” demanded Colonel Scott.

“Yes, sir.”

“You did?” asked Tom Gray sharply.

“Yes.”

“Come! Out with it. What did you discover?”

“I discovered the proprietor on the second floor, and he discovered me at about the same time,” replied Stacy soberly, thrusting his hands deeper into his pockets and strolling away.

“Is there no way of suppressing that impossible young man?” complained Emma.

“It is my opinion that you would miss him,” chuckled the colonel. “Shall we see you in the morning?”

Tom said yes, and, after good-nights were said, the Overlanders started for their camp. Grace halted as they reached the rear of the hotel and pointed to the rear veranda.

“Suppose we have a look at the roof of the veranda to-morrow morning, Tom,” she suggested. “My intuition tells me that the thieves made their entry by the way of the veranda roof.”

“Leave that to others,” answered Tom.

“If they don’t think it worthwhile to take a look at the roof of the veranda, what then?” laughed Grace.

“Have your own way, my dear. You will, anyway. If you must, however, ask Hippy to accompany you. He is a better sleuth than I am, and, besides, I have work to do in the morning.”

“Oh, thank you, Tom. You are always such a dear, but you know I am a dutiful wife and never oppose my husband,” added Grace demurely. A short time after that the girls were pouring the tale of the robbery into Lieutenant Wingate’s ear. Hippy put down his saddle and gave close attention to the story.

“I am sorry about that,” he said. “The colonel’s friends appear to be very fine people. How do they think the robbery was committed?”

“Someone said it was believed that one of the servants did the job,” Elfreda Briggs informed Hippy.

After the party had broken up into groups, Tom told Lieutenant Wingate that Grace had the crazy idea that she knew where the robbers had entered the hotel.

“She wants me to go down there with her ir the morning and sleuth it for clews. I told her to take you, and that you are a much better sleuth than I,” said Tom laughingly.

“Thomas, you never spoke a truer word in your life. Leave it to the brilliant brains of Grace Harlowe Gray and Theophilus Wingate to solve this dark mystery. By the way, how much did the thieves get?”

Tom said he did not know. Later on, Tom, Grace and Hippy arranged that she and Lieutenant Wingate were to go down to the hotel early in the morning, reaching there by daylight for their own private inquiry into the robbery.

“As I have said before, it’s a crazy idea, and is none of our business,” declared Tom.

“Ordinarily I should agree with that, but I have an idea in the back of my head that this affair may prove to be our business,” answered Grace reflectively.

“Go to it,” was Tom’s smiling reply.

Daybreak of the following morning found Lieutenant Wingate and Grace strolling down towards the hotel. At that early hour there were no signs of activity about the place until both got a sudden scare when a garbage barrel in the rear of the hotel tipped over with a bang and a black bear ambled away. The bear, however, was more frightened than were the two Overlanders.

“That is what a guilty conscience does,” laughed Grace, referring to the start the bear had given them and to bruin’s hurried departure.

Both stepped back and surveyed the rear veranda roof and the window through which entrance might be gained to the small hallway. They saw that it would be easy for a person to gain the veranda roof, and that no obstacle would then intervene for entrance into the building. Hippy and Grace now examined the ground all along the rear of the house, working towards each other from opposite ends.

“Come here!” called Hippy just loudly enough to reach the ears of his companion.

“What is it, Hippy?”

“Here is where some person jumped down from the porch roof,” he said. “See! The heel marks of a pair of boots are plain and recently made.”

“Yes, that is all very well, Hippy, but did they first climb to the roof?”

“I don’t know, but I’m going to find out,” muttered Hippy. Lieutenant Wingate stood on the porch rail and peered up over the sloping roof. He was clinging to the edge of the roof with one hand while the other hand grasped a vine that grew up over the veranda roof.

“I can’t see anything that looks like a clew,” declared Hippy.

“Then you aren’t nearly so observant as I thought,” replied Grace.

“Eh? What’s that?”

“The vine has been quite recently torn at the edge almost under your hand, just as if someone had used it to assist him in climbing to the roof, and there are the marks of someone’s boots on the rail where you are standing. Hippy, what is the matter with your eyes?” laughed Grace.

“I never could see in the morning,” complained Hippy. “You’re right, Brown Eyes.” Getting down, he examined the heel marks on the ground. Lieutenant Wingate then picked up the trail in earnest and followed the footprints a little way back of the hotel. He soon discovered that another pair of boots had joined the first, and together had gone away in the direction of the Overland camp.

Hippy followed these bootprints, Grace trailing along behind him for some distance, then they lost the trail entirely on hard ground, and were unable to find it again.

“Well, what is your conclusion?” questioned Grace as her companion stood thoughtfully gazing up towards their camp.

“My conclusion is that the hotel was entered from the rear, that two men were in the game, and that they headed towards our camp after committing the robbery, and that is all I know about it. I must have been mending my saddle when they passed the camp. Grace, what have you a mind that you are so eager to find the thieves? Why don’t you drop it?”

“Why don’t you?” retorted Grace.

“Because I saw last night that you had some idea in the back of your head that you didn’t care to talk about. What is it? Now is as good a time as any for a full confession.”

Grace shook her head.

“No. Not yet. Even the bears have ears. But, Hippy, should I be right in my intuition, you and the rest of our party are certain to meet with a great surprise before we have done with our journey through the Yellowstone National Park,” replied Grace soberly.