Then he had a vision.  He saw himself drilling into a safe.  Then came a dull explosion and when the safe’s door was torn from its hinges he saw himself upon his knees filling a large bag with the gold coins which poured out of the dynamited treasure box.  Then he saw Joe and himself dressed in the best that money could purchase, speeding along aboard a Pullman to Rugby, North Dakota.  He felt the hearty hand grip as Joe’s mother thanked him for having kept her boy from coming to harm, and when he saw himself the prosperous owner of an immense and well worked farm, he then and there swore a silent but nevertheless solemn oath that after the next successful safe-blowing exploit he would do exactly as this vision had showed him would be the best method to turn over a new page of his life.

“Look out, Slippery, jump for your life!” suddenly came a frightened cry from Joe’s lips, and instinctively Slippery followed Joe’s example and leaped off the track, upon which they had been so peacefully walking, blissfully ignorant of how close to death they had come.  In the next fraction of a second a “Limited” thundered past them, whose ashen-faced engineer was frantically pulling at the whistling cord and blowing the danger signal, while he shook an angry fist at the frightened fellows, who had so narrowly escaped an impending calamity.

“Joe,” stammered Slippery, when he again found his voice that from sheer fright failed him for some moments, “boy, you have saved my life and come what may I shall stay and work with you and then after we have made a ‘stake’ we will go to Rugby and I shall buy a farm and make my home near your home and finish my days in peace and plenty.”

From this moment Slippery became a different kind of companion to his younger comrade, and while both now entered into an animated conversation, Joe came to the conclusion that Slippery after all was the best chum he had ever had.  They were so busily engaged picturing their futures, that not until evening approached did Joe make any remark concerning the whereabouts of the “big oak” where they were to meet Jim and Kansas Shorty.

[Illustration:  “Jump for your life!” suddenly shouted the lad, and both leaped off the track, escaping by a hair’s breadth being struck by the flying passenger train.]

They were just approaching a water tank, the destination Slippery intended to reach, and pointing at a large oak close to the track he told Joe that it was the place where he had agreed to meet the others.  They went over to it, and after they had made for themselves some coffee, they sat beneath the wide spreading branches of the oak and while dusk turned into night and the calls of the owls echoed over fields and moor, and the moon cast its pale light over the landscape, they patiently waited the arrival of the others.  The longer they waited and the more anxious Joe became to meet his twin brother again, the more Slippery denounced Kansas Shorty’s tardiness, and when