This statement was corroborated by Dodge’s physical appearance, for he looked haggard and worn.

Jesse was now confident that he had found Dodge, in spite of the reports of the New Orleans police to the contrary, and he was also reasonably sure that the fugitive was too sick to leave the hotel immediately.  He therefore telegraphed his superiors that he had discovered Dodge and that the latter was ill at the St. Charles Hotel.

At three o’clock in the afternoon Jesse received a wire from New York as follows: 

“New Orleans police department claims party not there.  Left for Mexico three weeks ago.  Ascertain correct destination and wire at once.”

Jesse at once replied: 

“No question as to identity and presence here at this time.”

He now took up the task of keeping his quarry under absolute surveillance day and night, which duty from that moment he continued for a period of nearly ten months.

During the remainder of the afternoon and throughout the night Dodge and Bracken remained in room Number 420, and during the evening were visited by several strangers, including a plain-clothes officer from the New Orleans Police Headquarters.  Little Hummel, dining in Long Acre Square in the glare of Broadway, was pressing some invisible button that transmitted the power of his influence even to the police government of a city two thousand miles away.

The following day, January 26th, at about 8.40 in the morning, Dodge and Bracken descended to the lobby.  Bracken departed from the hotel, leaving Dodge to pay the bill at the cashier’s window and Jesse heard him order a cab for the 11.30 A. M. Sunset Limited on the Southern Pacific Railroad and direct that his baggage be removed from his room.  Jesse did the same.

In the meantime Bracken returned and promptly at 11 A. M. left for the railroad station in a cab with Dodge.  Jesse followed in another.  As the two passed through the gates the detective caught a glimpse of Dodge’s ticket and saw that it had been issued by the Mexican National Railway.  Retiring to the telegraph office in the station he wired New York as follows: 

“Bird flying.—­Sunset Limited.  Destination not known.  I am with him.”

He then hastily purchased a ticket to Houston, Texas, and boarded the train.  Dodge’s companion had bidden him good-by as the engine started, and Jesse’s task now became that of ferreting out Dodge’s destination.  After some difficulty he managed to get a glimpse of the whole of the fugitive’s ticket and thus discovered that he was on his way to the City of Mexico, via Eagle Pass, Texas, while from the Pullman conductor he learned that Dodge had secured sleeping-car accommodation as far as San Antonio, Texas, only.

So far all was well.  He knew Dodge but Dodge did not know him, and later on in the afternoon he had the satisfaction of a long talk with his quarry in the observation car where they amiably discussed together current events and argued politics with the same vehemence as if they had been commercial travellers thrown fortuitously into each other’s company.  Dodge, however, cleverly evaded any reference to his destination.