CHAPTER XXII.
"CAN YOUR ROAD SAVE ITS CHARTER NOW ?" "Oh, I guess the train will go through, all right," replied Tom Reade, with much more confidence expressed in his tone than he really felt.
"Stay with us and see it go through," mocked 'Gene Black.
"If it's just the same to you I'd rather ride on," Tom proposed.
"But it isn't all the same to us," Black chuckled.
"Then I guess I prefer to ride on, anyway." "You won't, though," snapped Black.

"You'll get off that horse and do as we tell you." "Eh ?" demanded the young chief engineer.

He appeared astonished, though he was not.
"You came down the line to meet your railroad detective, Fulsbee," Black continued sneeringly.

"You'd better give it up." "You seem to think you know a good deal about my business," Tom continued.
"I know all about the telegram," 'Gene retorted.

"I sent it---or ordered it sent." Tom started in earnest this time.
"Did you ever hear of ways of cutting out a telegraph wire and then attaching one of the cut ends to a box relay ?" queried the scoundrel.
"I---I believe I have heard of some such thing," Reade hesitated.
"Was that the trick you played on me ?" "Yes," nodded Gene Black.