“Oh, I just enjoyed beating him,” said Burns.  “Wish he’d put up more of a fight, though.  I’d have licked him just the same, but it would have been more like a real fight.  Well, I don’t hear that train yet, and the station’s just around that next bend.  Not much of a place—­Tecumseh.  Hasn’t any right to such a fine name, I think.”

The prospect when they rounded the turn in the road bore out his slur on the village of Tecumseh.  It wasn’t much of a place—­scarcely more than the village part of Hedgeville, as Bessie saw.  The station was there, and two or three stores and a post office.  But Bessie and Dolly were more interested in the man who was sitting gloomily, watch in hand, on the station steps.  It was Holmes, and his face, when he saw them, was a picture.

“Well, how in the world did you get here?” he asked, angrily.  “That was a fine trick you played on me, running off, and leaving me to worry about you!  You might have been killed.”

“I like your nerve!” exclaimed Dolly, before Bessie could answer, surprised by the cool way in which Holmes tried to shift the blame to their shoulders.  “Look here, Mr. Holmes, we know all about you, and why you took us on that ride.  You wanted to get Bessie into the state where she came from, so that Farmer Weeks could keep her there!”

A look of black anger swept across his face, handsome enough when he did not let his real character stand revealed.

“Yes, there’s no use trying to deceive us any more with your smooth talk, Mr. Holmes,” said Bessie.  “I listened to what you said over the telephone, and we heard you telling Jake Hoover how to catch us when we went to take the trolley, too.”

“Yes,” countered Dolly.  “If you had been as smart as you thought you were, you could have caught us then—­we were within a few feet of you while you were talking to him.”

“Well, I’m near enough to catch you now!” said Holmes, and he made a grab for Bessie, and caught her just as she started to run away.  He began dragging her across the tracks and toward the state line, but Bill Burns came out of the post office at that moment.

“Here, you let her alone!” he shouted, springing forward, and Holmes dropped Bessie’s arm to ward off the blow that Burns aimed at him.

“What are you butting in for?” he snarled, “Want to get yourself in jail?”

“Never you mind what I want to do,” said Burns.  “Don’t you try to touch either of those girls again!  If you do, you’ll find that I can hit you as hard as you ever was hit in your life.  And if I ever get into jail, you won’t be the one to put me there, either—­I’ll bet money on that!”

There might have been more argument, but just then the whistle of the approaching train sounded, and a moment later it had drawn into the station, separating the two girls and Burns from Holmes very effectually.

Bessie and Dolly sprang up the steps at once, and turned to wave good-bye to Bill Burns, who had helped them so splendidly.  He stood below, grinning at them, and waving his hand, and as they began to move out of range he called out cheerily to them:  “Well, I’ll be over to see Walt pretty soon.  Don’t forget what I look like!”