hat the man sitting there
possesses red hair and beard--the irrepressible Professor Darlington
Ruggles, of Chicago. He has been eminently successful thus far in his
plot for the safe abduction of Nell Darrel. Under the influence of a
powerful drug he conveyed her to the station, and set out on the
previous day for the East.

His companion was an invalid sister, who was in a comatose state a
portion of the time as the result of her ill health. This was the
story told by the Professor to inquisitive people, and the truth did
not come to the surface. Travelers, who become accustomed to seeing
all sorts of people, are not often suspicious.

The villain was more successful than he could have hoped. Within a few
hours he would be in New York, and then he felt that he could bid
defiance to pursuit.

It was now past midnight. The man from Chicago felt a deep drowsiness
stealing over him. He wished to shake it off, and so, rising and
seeing only people in an unconscious state about him, he concluded to
go into the smoking-car and enjoy a cigar. He began to feel nervous,
and such a stimulant seemed absolutely necessary.

The train drew into a station, paused less than a minute, and then
went swiftly on its way.

Calmly the scheming villain sat and puffed at his cigar until it was
more than half consumed, then he tossed the stump through the open
window, and once more he passed into the other car.

When he gained the seat he had lately occupied, he could not suppress
a cry of startled wonder.

THE SEAT WAS EMPTY!

He had left Nell Darrel there not more than twenty minutes since,
drugged into complete insensibility. She could not have gone from the
seat of her own volition.

An indefinable thrill of fear stole over the stalwart frame of
Professor Darlington Ruggles. He glanced up and down the car; the girl
was not in sight. But one person was awake, an old man, who said:

"Lookin' fur the young lady?"

The Professor nodded.

"She got off't last station." "Got off? How--"

"She had help, of course," explained the old passenger, quickly.

"Who helped her?" cried Ruggles, in a husky voice.

"An old woman, who got on and off at the last station quick's wink."

CHAPTER XXIII.

DYKE DARREL ON THE TRAIL.

The men who burst into Aunt Scarlet's room on the night that Professor
Ruggles departed from the block with Nell Darrel in his arms, were men
of determination and friends of the detective, who had gone int