The trail led them on for a distance of about five miles when an old blasted oak tree was met.
Here the cunning of the James Boys was shown.
Evidently fearing pursuit, they had ordered the gang to scatter in every direction, each one going to a different point of the compa.s.s.
It was then utterly impossible to follow any particular one of the gang, and know which one it was.
Jack was rendered angry.
"See there how they"ve baffled us!" he cried with a frown, as he pointed down at the scattered trails.
"Gee whiz!" groaned Tim, "they"ve throwed us off ther course entirely now, Wot one"ll we foller?"
"If you mean so that we can corral the James Boys, I cannot say--one trail is the same as another."
"Blast thar lubberly hides!"
"I"ve got a plan though."
"An wot"s that?"
"To pursue any one at random."
"But mebbe it won"t be ther one we wants."
"Any one will do. Whoever the man is, we can perhaps catch him and force him to confess where the rest are to meet. By that means we can find them again."
"Jist ther plan, by thunder!" cried Tim, pounding his good leg with his fist. "Keel haul me if you ain"t got as long a figgerhead as Jesse James, cute though he be."
Jack told Fritz and the sheriff what occurred, and what he now intended to do.
They agreed with his plan.
In fact it was the only feasible thing to do.
Accordingly Jack selected the most likely trail.
He then sent the Terror flying off after it, and she sped along until the afternoon set in before they finally sighted the man they were after.
Then they saw that he was Frank James.
CHAPTER X.
FRANK JAMES" ESCAPE.
Frank James was mounted upon his horse Jim Malone, and had paused on the crest of a hill from whence he gazed back at the bottom traversed by the Terror.
He saw the stage, and realized at once that it had followed his particular trail to the exclusion of the rest of the band.
It was clear enough to him that he could not outstrip the Terror in a running race, and would therefore be obliged to retain his liberty by resorting to strategy.
What course he could follow would depend entirely upon circ.u.mstances, but he turned over fifty plans in his mind.
Jack was a league from the man when he recognized him, but he had a powerful field gla.s.s, which plainly showed him every feature of Frank James" face.
"The rascal sees us," he commented.
"Wot"s he standin" thar for like a statoo?" asked Tim.
"Probably sizing up our intentions."
"Dot retskal vos a gone goose," said Fritz, decisively.
"Better wait till you get your paws on him before you feel so certain about it," dryly remarked the sheriff. "If you knew the James Boys as well as I do, you would realize that no slipperier men exist on the face of the earth. Just when you are surest you have them is the time you haven"t got the scoundrels. Ha! There he goes!"
Frank had galloped away.
He went down the other side of the hill.
In a few moments he disappeared from view.
Jack increased the speed of the stage.
She ran ahead like a locomotive.
In less than ten minutes she reached the crest of the elevation where they had seen the bandit.
From this point a view was commanded of the country for many miles in various directions.
Jack soon saw the outlaw.
He had gone down the valley, and was furiously galloping toward the rocky, well wooded foothills on the other side of the depression, and Jack exclaimed:
"He is well aware of our weakest point."
"Vot veak point?" growled Fritz unwilling to admit such a thing.
"Our inability to run among rocks and close setting trees and bushes.
"It looks mighty like as if he wuz atryin" ter git inter sich a spot."
"You an right, Tim. But he has lost a mile though."
Down the declivity shot the stage, and she swiftly reduced the distance that separated her from the fugitive.
As the flying horseman went up the hill on the other side of the valley, he glanced back over his shoulder and saw that the Terror had arrived within a mile.
Fast as Jim Malone was on a level stretch, he could not race up the steep grade of a hill with anything like the speed at which the Terror went.