e news up there, and
some of their boys have started out to see about earning that hundred
dollars reward. It might have been telephoned up, you know."

"But all the same you don't believe that, Fred!" Corney exclaimed.

"It looks mighty suspicious, in my eyes, with that deserted mill so near
by, and us believin' they've got our chum held up there," Bristles
remarked, mysteriously.

"I don't think he saw us, do you, Fred?" asked Sid.

"To tell the truth I don't; because he seemed to be looking the other
way," answered the one spoken to. "And perhaps it might be just as well
for us, boys, to make ourselves scarce right now. Here's some bushes
where we can hide."

"What do you mean to do, Fred; jump out and grab Wagner, and make him
own up?" demanded Corney, as the five boys started to conceal
themselves back of the bush patch.

"Well, we ought to know what he's doing over here, and right now of all
times. You said we were close to the old lane that leads to the mill,
didn't you, Sid?" asked Fred.

"It lies just a stone's throw further along the road than the spot where
you saw Wagner through that opening in the trees," the other remarked.

"H'st! he's a-comin', fellers; you want to lie low, and stop gabblin',"
warned Bristles, who happened to have chosen a position where he had a
clearer view along the road than his mates.

So they relapsed into silence, waiting for the other boy to get
opposite, when it was expected that Fred would give a signal for them to
spring out and surround Wagner.

They could hear him whistling, as if perfectly care-free. Fred was
reminded of Gabe Larkins, the butcher's boy, who used to have such a
tremendous whistle, as though by this means he would defy anyone to even
suspect that he could be guilty of wrong doing.

Another thing Fred noticed, as he peered out at the advancing boy;
Wagner was not in running costume, which would go to prove that a desire
to practice could hardly have taken him away over here, three miles from
home.

It looked suspicious, to say the least. Bristles was moving uneasily, as
though he began to fear that Fred might want to let the other pass by;
such a course would be very unpleasant to Bristles, impatient of
restraint. He hoped that they would make a prisoner of the boy from
Mechanicsburg, and force him by dire threats to confess to what he and
his comrades had done with the crack Riverport sprinter, Colon.

Wagner, besides being the captain of the