e right time comes!"

"There's Ventner!" exclaimed Tommy as the detective came rushing down
the platform. "Of course the good, kind gentleman would want to bid us
farewell!"

"I'd like to crack him over the coco!" exclaimed Sandy.

"I'll bet he's got some kind of a fake story to tell," suggested Will.
"He looks like a man who had been working his imagination overtime!"

"News of the two boys!" shouted the detective as he came up smiling.

CHAPTER X

THE BOY IN THE "EMPTY"

"Didn't I tell you," whispered Will, "that he is there with a product of
his imagination? If you leave it to him, the two boys we're in search of
are somewhere on the Pacific slope!"

"He must think we're a lot of suckers to take in any story he'll tell!"
whispered Tommy. "A person that couldn't get next to his game ought to
be locked Up in the foolish house!"

"I've just heard from a railway brakeman," Ventner said, rushing up to
the boys with an air of importance, "that the two lads you are in search
of were seen leaving a box car at a little station in Ohio. I don't just
recall the name of the station now, but I can find it by looking on the
map! It seems the lads left here on the night following their departure
from the breaker, and stole their passage to this little town I'm
telling you about."

"Good thing you came to the depot," declared Will. "We should have been
out of town in ten minutes more!"

"Where is this town?" asked George, thinking it best to show great
interest in the statement made by the detective.

"It's a little place on the Lake Erie & Western road!" was the answer.

The detective took a railroad folder from his pocket and consulted a
map. It seemed to take him a long time to decide upon a place, but he
finally spread the map out against the wall of the station and laid his
finger on a point on the Lake Erie & Western railroad.

"Nankin is the name of the place. Strange I should have forgotten the
name of the place. They were put out of the car at Nankin, and are
believed to have started down the railroad right of way on foot."

"But you said they were seen leaving the car at Nankin!" Tommy cut in.
"Now you say they were put out of the car!"

"Well, they were chased out of the car, and that covers both
statements," replied the detective somewhat nervously.

"Thank you very much for the information!" Will exclaimed as the train
the boys were to take came rolling into the station. "The pointer is
undo