At ten o'clock the commercial wires went out from Rockton, and a special operator now sat over in a corner of the dispatcher's room at an extra instrument taking press news over a roundabout circuit. Everything went by jerks and starts. The insulation was bad and sometimes the sounders moved without giving out any intelligible vibration. Towards eleven o'clock the rush was over on regular business, but the delayed train list began to pile up alarmingly. Everything was late. Within the next half hour two blockades, four stalled freights and two telegraph lines down were reported. It was now that Ralph was put distinctly on his mettle. Glidden watched him anxiously but admiringly from under his deep set eyebrows, and so far did not have to check up an error in orders or a mistake in judgment. On either side of Ralph was a card. That on the right hand side had the names of all the stations from Stanley Junction to Rockton. The one on the left side had all the stations from Rockton to Stanley Junction. On both cards some of the stations had been crossed off, particularly on the right hand card. In fact only one station this side of terminus remained. Glidden went quickly over to Ralph's table as a message ticked out that both had been waiting for. With a somewhat triumphant smile Ralph checked off the last station with a dash of his pencil. "Gone through, eh?" spoke Glidden with a grin. "Safe and snug," answered Ralph. "You heard--one hour late on account of the snow, but no attack." "Good thing for the conspirators," observed Glidden. "Either they found out it was a trap or saw the half dozen armed guards inside." "Perhaps they fancied we knew too much and gave up the experiment of robbing the pay car." "Well, she's through--now for the other one. How is it?" "Heavy snow, but she's making time," reported Ralph, glancing at the remaining card. "83 is a hundred miles out of Rockton. Just passed Shoreham on the Mountain Division." "Say, those fellows will never guess what they've missed till it's too late, hey?" "It seems so," nodded Ralph. There was a lapse of messages now. Only the ceaseless grind of press dispatches clicked from the instrument over in the corner. Ralph sat back and took a breathing spell. The pay car had gone through--the dummy pay car rather--which had left the Junction at eight o'clock that morning. It had been loaded up pretentiously with the apparent usual bags of coin and little safes that were used on regular trips. These, however, contained no money. The paymaster went aboard ostentatiously. The doors and windows were securely locked as usual. Inside, however, were half a dozen men armed to the teeth. The dummy pay car was a bait for the robbers. They had not appeared. The cypher message to Ralph just received told him that the train had reached terminus without hindrance or damage.