“Here, get into this and go down-stairs.  At the corner above, you’ll find a two-seated motor-car backed against the curb.  Do you know enough about machinery to start an auto-engine?”

Gryson nodded again.  “I’d ought to, seein’ that I’ve been a gang boss in a shop that made ’em.”

“Good enough; crank the motor, climb in, and wait.  I’ll do the rest.”

Five minutes later, Blount had stumbled out of the elevator at the ground-floor and was groping his way along the sidewalk toward the corner—­groping because the pain had become blinding again and the street-lights were taking on many-colored and fantastic brilliancies.

When he finally found the car, it was mainly by the sense of hearing; the motor was drumming softly under the hood, and there was a blur in the mechanician’s seat which answered for the crouching figure of the ward-worker.  By a supreme effort of will Blount swung himself up behind the steering-wheel and let the clutch in.  Luckily, the street was clear of vehicles and he made the turn in safety; but fully realizing his handicap, he steered straight away from the business district, and making a wide circuit through the residence quarter, brought the car out in the eastern suburb at the beginning of a road paralleling the Transcontinental tracks.

With the lights of the city dropping away to the rear, and the drumming motor quickened to racing speed, he told the fugitive from justice what was to be done and the manner of its doing.  Twenty-two miles out they would reach the coal-mine station of Wardlaw, a few minutes ahead of the Overland.  Since all east-bound trains stopped at the coal-mines to coal the engines, the way of escape would be open.

Something more than a wordless, space-devouring half-hour beyond this, Blount applied the brakes and dropped his passenger at the rear of the small iron-roofed building which served as the railroad station for the coal-mines.  Far to the rear on the twenty-two-mile tangent the headlight of the coming train showed like a blazing star low on the western horizon.

“Go and blacken your face and hands at one of the slack dumps and pass yourself for a miner quitting his job,” was Blount’s parting suggestion; but the hollow-eyed fugitive had a last word to say, too, and he said it.

“I’ve been t’ hell and back, as I told you, and ‘twas f’r on’y th’ wan thing:  give me your word, Evan Blount, that you’ll chop th’ damn’ tree down and let it lie where it falls!  That’s all I’m askin’, this trip.”

“You needn’t lose any sleep worrying about that,” was the curt reply; and without waiting for the train arrival, Blount turned the car and sent it racing on the way back to the city.

By all the tests he knew how to apply, he was little better than a dead man when he returned the hired auto to the side-street garage and made his halting way around to the hotel.  He had long since given up the idea of trying to see Blenkinsop.  He knew that the editor would not be in his office much before ten o’clock, and the two-hour wait was not to be endured.