CHAPTER IV WHAT PHIL’S LETTER TOLD

Mr. Ralph Obray was much surprised at the statement made by Roger, and his face showed it.

“That is a pretty strong statement to make against anybody,” he said slowly. “Perhaps you had better explain.”

“I can do that easily enough,” returned the senator’s son. “And Dave here can tell you even more than I can.”

“By the way,” broke in Dave, “may I ask if the fellow left any name?”

“Oh, yes.” The manager of the construction camp glanced at a slip of paper lying on his desk. “Jasper Nicholas.”

“Jasper Nicholas!” cried Roger. “What do you know about that?”

“It sounds a good deal like Nicholas Jasniff turned around,” answered our hero. He looked at the manager. “The fellow we have in mind was named Nicholas Jasniff,” he explained.

“Tell me what you know about the fellow,” returned Mr. Obray shortly.

Thereupon the two chums related how they had 35been schoolmates with Nick Jasniff and Link Merwell at Oak Hall and how Jasniff had one day attacked Dave in the gymnasium with an Indian club and how the fellow had run away. Then they told of the robbery of the Wadsworth jewelry works, and of how Jasniff and Merwell had been followed to Cave Island and captured.

“At the last minute Merwell got away,” continued Dave, “but the authorities hung on to Jasniff and he was tried and sent to prison for a long term of years. How he got out I don’t know.”

“That is certainly an interesting story,” said Mr. Obray. “But if that fellow Jasniff is in prison he can’t be the fellow that called here.”

“But look at the similarity in names!” broke in Roger. “Oh, I am sure he is the same fellow.”

“If he is, we won’t want him around here even if he has a right to his liberty,” declared the manager. “Our men are all honest—or at least we think they are—and we can not take chances with a man who has been convicted of a crime. Of course, such a fellow has a right to do his best to get along in the world; but he had better go to some place where nobody knows him.”

“Don’t you think we had better try to find out whether Jasniff has really served his full term and been properly discharged from prison?” remarked Dave. “If he is a fugitive we ought to 36capture him and send him back to the authorities.”

“You are right there, Porter. It might be a good idea for you to send a message to the East to find out about this.”

“Where do you think I ought to send for information?”

“Do you know where he was placed in prison?”

“Oh, yes.”

“Then I would send directly to the prison authorities.”

“Let us send a telegram!” cried Roger. “A letter would be too slow. I’ll stand half the expense.”

“All right, I’ll go you!” responded our hero quickly. “If Nick Jasniff got out of prison on the sly, he ought to be returned to the place.”

“Maybe if he did get out, and we captured him, we might get a reward, Dave.”

“That is true, too—provided a reward has been offered.”

“You seem to be pretty sure that this fellow who called here is the man you are after,” remarked Mr. Obray. “Don’t you think you may be mistaken? In that storm, and with the fellow galloping past you on horseback all hunched up to keep from getting wet, you may have made a mistake.”

At this remark the face of the senator’s son became clouded.

37“It might be so, Dave. To tell the truth, we didn’t get a very good look at him. And yet I think it was Nick Jasniff.”

“I’m almost certain of it, Roger. I’ll never forget that face of his. I studied it pretty well when he was up for trial and we testified against him.”

“You might wait until he comes here again,” suggested the manager.

“Yes. But then we wouldn’t have the information we want,” declared Dave. “I’d rather pay out my money on that telegram and learn the truth. Then, if Jasniff was wanted by the authorities, we could make a prisoner of him right then and there.”

“That is true.”

The matter was discussed for several minutes longer, and then the two chums walked back to their quarters. Here they talked the matter over between themselves.

“We can’t send a telegram to-night; the office closes at six o’clock,” declared Dave. “We can write it out, however, and send it the first chance we get in the morning. I think Mr. Obray will let you or me ride down to the telegraph office with it.” The nearest station from which a telegram could be sent was quite a distance away, and a telephone line between the two points, while it was being erected, was not yet in operation.

38Of course Frank Andrews wished to know what had taken place, and the youths told him. He shook his head sadly.

“It’s too bad! Especially with a young fellow,” he declared. “That term in prison will hang over him like a cloud all the rest of his life. Kind-hearted people may talk all they please and do all they possibly can—the fact remains that if a man has once been in prison, unless he can prove that he was innocent, very few people will care to have anything to do with him.”

“If Jasniff were a different kind of fellow I’d have a different feeling for him,” said Dave; and his face showed his earnestness. “If he had been led into crime by others it would be a different story. But so far as I can remember, he was always hot-tempered, vicious, and bound to have his own way. He was the leader in that robbery—not Merwell. And when he was captured he acted in anything but a penitent mood. On that account I can’t get up much sympathy for him.”

“He doesn’t deserve any sympathy!” cried Roger. “Why, every time I think of how he grabbed up that Indian club in the Oak Hall gymnasium and did his best to brain you with it, it makes my blood run cold!”

“He certainly must have been a pretty wicked boy to attempt anything like that,” was Frank Andrews’ comment. “It’s bad enough for schoolboys 39to fight with their fists; but that at least is a fair way to do.”

The two chums were tired out from their strenuous adventures of the day, and were glad to retire early. During the night the storm cleared away entirely, and in the morning the sun shown as brightly as ever.

“If you don’t mind, Dave, I’ll take that telegram down to the office,” said Roger, while the pair were dressing. “I’m expecting a box that father said he was sending, and I can ask for that at the same time.”

“All right, Roger. But you had better wait until the mail gets in. There may be some other message we’ll want to send.”

The mail was brought in while the youths were at breakfast, and was distributed immediately after that repast was over.

“Hello, here’s a letter from Phil!” cried our hero, as he noticed the postmark “Philadelphia.”

“I’ve got the box from dad,” returned the senator’s son, “so I won’t have to ask about that at the express office.”

“I knew it!” exclaimed Dave, who had ripped the letter open and was scanning its contents. “Phil is coming out here to pay a visit to Star Ranch; and he says he may bring Shadow Hamilton with him. Isn’t that the best ever?”

“So it is, Dave! But it’s no more than I expected—at 40least so far as Phil is concerned. I knew he couldn’t remain away from Belle Endicott very long,” and the senator’s son winked suggestively.

“Here’s a lot of news about the other fellows, Luke Watson, Polly Vane, and Jim Murphy. Polly has gone into business with an uncle of his, and Jim Murphy has a well-paying position up at Yale.”

“I’m glad to hear it. Polly Vane was one of the finest fellows that ever lived, even if he was somewhat girlish. And as for Jim Murphy—there was never a better monitor around Oak Hall.”

Dave had turned over to the last sheet of the six-page communication Phil Lawrence had sent. Here the letter proper came to an end, but there was a postscript added in lead pencil. This ran as follows:

“You will be interested to know that some time ago Nick Jasniff’s case was brought up before the Board of Pardons by a Committee on Prison Reform. The men and women composing the committee made a strong plea for Jasniff because of his age, and I understand they made a very favorable impression on the Pardon Board. If Jasniff is pardoned, he will be getting out without having served even half of his sentence. I wish I had been there to tell the Board what sort of a fellow he is.”

41“Here’s the milk in the cocoanut, Roger!” cried Dave, and read aloud what Phil had written.

“Humph, so that’s the truth of it,” murmured the senator’s son. “More than likely that committee worked on the feelings of the Pardoning Board so that they gave Jasniff his liberty. Well, if that’s the case, there won’t be any need for sending that telegram.”

“You’re right. If he was pardoned, that ends it, and he has as much right to his liberty as we have to ours. Just the same, I think they made a mistake. When he was tried, I am sure the judge, on account of his age, gave him as short a sentence as he deemed best.”

“I’m sure of that too, Dave! Why, one of the lawyers told me that if Jasniff had been ten years older he would have gotten twice as long a sentence.”

“I think I had better go to Mr. Obray with this news,” said Dave. “You can tell Andrews if you want to.”

Our hero found the manager of the construction camp just preparing to go out with several of his assistant engineers. Explaining the situation, Dave allowed Mr. Obray to read the postscript of Phil’s letter.

“Looks as if you were right after all, and the fellow who was here had been pardoned,” was 42Ralph Obray’s comment. “In that case, you can’t do anything about having him held. Just the same, if he is that sort I won’t want him around.”

“If he comes again, may we see him to make sure that he is really this Nick Jasniff?”

“Certainly, Porter. If you are anywhere near, I’ll hold the man at the office, or wherever we happen to be, and send for you and Morr.”

Dave and Roger were now working under the directions of Frank Andrews. In the gang were two others—a young man named Larry Bond, and an elderly engineer named Hixon. All had become well acquainted and were good friends. Hixon was from the West and had spent many years of his life on the cattle ranges and in the gold fields.

“I was a prospector for six years,” he once declared. “But, believe me, it didn’t pay. Sometimes I struck it pretty rich; but then would come long dry spells when I wouldn’t get a thing. All told, I didn’t do as well, year in and year out, as I am now doing at regular wages.”

Andrews’ gang, as it was termed, had some work to do at Section Five of the proposed line, the work, of course, being preliminary to that which was to be made on the erection of the bridges to be built. This was in a decidedly rocky part of the territory, and the young civil engineers 43and the others had no easy time of it making their survey.

“Some different from sitting in your room at Oak Hall working out a problem in geometry, eh?” remarked Dave to Roger, after a particularly hard climb over the rocks.

“I should say so,” panted the senator’s son.

“You look out that that chain doesn’t get away from you,” cried Dave, pointing to the long coiled-up steel measure which the other was carrying at his belt. The real civil engineer’s, or surveyor’s, chain is largely a thing of the past, the steel measure having taken its place.

Frank Andrews and the others were at a distance and young Bond was wigwagging his signals across a deep cut in the hills. Now Dave prepared to signal in return, at the same time holding up his leveling-rod as required. Roger attempted to climb around on the rough rocks, and then suddenly uttered a cry of dismay.

“What’s the matter?” asked Dave.

“That measure! I just started to fasten it tighter to my belt when it slipped out of my hands. There it goes—sliding down the rocks out there,” and the senator’s son pointed to a spot at least fifty feet below them.

While Dave was still signaling and moving his leveling-rod farther along as desired, Roger began to scramble down the rocks in the direction where 44the steel measure had fallen. He was gone for fully ten minutes when suddenly Dave heard a yell.

“What’s the matter, Roger?” he called, dropping the leveling-rod and the signal flag he held.

“It’s a snake—and a big one, too!” screamed the senator’s son. “Oh, Dave, come here and help me! My leg is caught between the rocks, and it’s a rattlesnake!”