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m assented. "Yet, on the other hand, it is possible that the fast moving train may have started the quicksand at some point. The next object that passes over, even if no heavier than an automobile, may meet with disaster. Mr. Hazelton and I can soon satisfy ourselves as to whether the roadbed has sagged at any point along the way. We shall ride nothing heavier than mustangs." "There is something in what you say, Mr. Reade. Go ahead. We will wait until we have your report." Tom and Harry accordingly mounted, riding off at a trot. Yet at some sections of the line they rode so slowly, studying the ground attentively, that it was fully half an hour before they had crossed the further edge of the Man-killer. "The engineers are signaling us, Mr. President," reported General Manager Ellsworth. "They are motioning us to go forward." Accordingly the party of railway officials entered their automobiles and started slowly off over the Man-killer. "Ride back and meet them, Harry," Tom suggested. "Show them that one point that we noticed." Hazelton accordingly dug his heels into the flank of his pony, starting off at a gallop. Two or three minutes passed. Then Mr. Ellsworth leaped from his seat in the foremost automobile, standing erect in the car and pointing excitedly. "Look there!" he shouted lustily. "What's happening?" Away off, at the further side of the Man-killer, a horseman had suddenly ridden into sight from behind a sand pile. His swiftly moving pony had gotten within three hundred yards of the chief engineer before Tom looked up to behold the newcomer. From where the railroad officials watched they could hear nothing, though they saw a succession of indistinct spittings from something in the right hand of the horseman. "It's a revolver the fellow's shooting at Mr. Reade!" gasped Superintendent Hawkins, leaping into the car beside the general manager. "Turn your speed on, man--make a lightning lash across the Man-killer!" Away shot the automobile, not wholly to the liking of two eastern men who sat in the directors' car. Tom Reade had realized his danger. Having nothing with which to fight, Reade had sprung his horse eastward and was racing for life. The unknown had emptied his weapon, but that did not deter him, for, continuing his wild pursuit, the stranger could be seen to draw another automatic revolver. The bullets striking all about Tom's pony ploughed up the sand. Within a minu
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