e.
As soon as he stopped the negro's horse, the black man raised a stick
he carried and aimed a blow at the boy's head.
"G'way f'om dar!" he yelled.
Harry bounded out of reach of the blow.
The descending stick hit the horse and it gave a sudden leap that
dismounted the man, and went plunging away at a furious rate.
The negro landed on his back on the ground.
In a moment Harry pounced upon him.
Pushing his pistol in the man's face, he cried:
"Surrender, you black fiend, or I'll bore you!"
"Don't shoot, boss!" roared the coon, frantically.
"Are you going to submit?"
"Yassah, yassah!"
"Without a fight?"
"Fo' sho' I is."
"Roll over on your face."
"Ober I go! Don't fire!" said the coon, turning over.
"Now, put your hands on your back."
"Heah dey am, boss!"
And the negro did as he was told.
Out came Harry's handcuffs, "click!" they snapped on his wrists, and in
another instant the man was a prisoner.
When Old King Brady reached the boy he was pulling a big navy revolver
out of the man's hip pocket.
"Got him, Harry?"
"Safe, Old King Brady."
"Get him upon his feet."
They raised the man, and now got a good square look at him.
He was a short, heavily-built fellow, clad in rags, and had as
villainous a face as any they had ever seen.
The man was trembling with fear.
It was plain he was an arrant coward.
When the detectives looked him over, Old King Brady asked him:
"Say, what's your name?"
"Nick Wiffles."
"Where do you live?"
"In de swamp."
"Ain't you the man who built a bonfire on the railroad track some time
ago, to stop a train from running into an obstruction?"
"I is."
"And you did it to stop the train?"
"He done telled me ter do it, boss."
"So you could steal a box containing Mr. Dalton's body from the baggage
car during the confusion?"
"Dat's about de size ob it."
"And you got Dalton's body out of the box and carried it into the
swamp?"
"I did."
"Into the hut?"
"Yassah."
"Were you alone?"
"All alone."
"When you got the body in the hut, what did you do with it?"
"I ain't a-gwine ter tell yer."
"All this was prearranged between you and Mason, wasn't it?"
"Yassah."
Old King Brady smiled. He had cleared up another mystery.
CHAPTER XIV.
EXPOSING THE SWAMP MYSTERY.
The Bradys were surprised at the prompt manner in which the negro
answered the questions put to him. But they presently observed that
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