conceived a plan to use him against Creviss. He had risen early, and
when he found that all the boys were in bed except Carl, he immediately
suspected the truth.

But Carl's despairing manner turned him from anger.

"Never mind, Carl," he said. "It was my fault for putting you on watch.
You were not cut out for a watchman. Or, perhaps, you were, according
to the funny papers, but not of prisoners."

During breakfast Carl was compelled to endure the jokes of the boys at
his failure to guard the prisoner, which he did with a lugubrious
countenance; then, at a signal from Ted, the subject was dropped.

About ten o'clock Billy Sudden rode up to the ranch house.

There was something in his manner that betokened news of importance, and
he strode unbidden into the living room, where Ted was sitting at his
desk.

"Where's the kid?" he asked abruptly.

"Who, Farley?" asked Ted, looking up from his work.

"Yes."

"Skipped."

"What?"

"I said skipped."

"Great Scott! I'd give a hundred dollars if he hadn't."

"Why?"

"What time did he get away?"

"Don't know, exactly. Carl was watching him, but he fell asleep almost
as soon as they were in the room together, and didn't wake up until six
o'clock this morning, and Farley was gone. No one knows how he got away
or at what time. It might have been any time. He probably woke up in the
night and saw that Carl was dead to the world, and opened the window,
dropped to the ground, and hit the trail. That's all I know about it.
But what makes you so anxious about it?"

"Then you haven't heard the news?"

"Guess not. What is it?"

"The First National Bank was robbed last night."

"Great guns! Creviss' bank! That's the United States depository!"

"The same."

"What are the details?"

"I rode through town this morning on my way over here to see if being
confined for the night wouldn't make the kid talk, when I saw a bunch of
men standing in front of the bank. I butted in and asked what the
excitement was, and they told me that the bank had been robbed."

"But how?"

"That's what nobody knows. When the cashier, Mr. Henson, got to the bank
this morning everything apparently was all right. The doors and windows
were fastened, and there was no sign anywhere that the bank had been
forcibly entered. Of course, he didn't look at these things first. He
went to the vault and opened it at the proper time and examined its
contents casually. Everything seemed to be as usua