Either the commander of the "Terror" would be surprised before he had a chance to escape, or he would take to flight and we must give up all hope of arresting him.
I found Arthur Wells to be a man of about forty, large and powerful.
I knew him by reputation to be one of the best of our local police agents.

Cool in danger and enterprising always, he had proven his daring on more than one occasion at the peril of his life.

He had been in Toledo on a wholly different mission, when chance had thrown him on the track of the "Terror." We drove rapidly along the shore of Lake Erie, toward the southwest.
This inland sea of water is on the northern boundary of the United States, lying between Canada on one side and the States of Ohio, Pennsylvania and New York on the other.

If I stop to mention the geographical position of this lake, its depth, its extent, and the waters nearest around, it is because the knowledge is necessary for the understanding of the events which were about to happen.
The surface of Lake Erie covers about ten thousand square miles.

It is nearly six hundred feet above sea level.