Page:Harry Castlemon - The Steel Horse.djvu/426

 were there. Joe thought he knew what Tom had come for, and was made sure of it when Tom ranged alongside of him, after a short halt had been made and the hand-shaking was over, and in a roundabout way began making inquiries concerning Matt Coyle. Joe was sorry he couldn't tell much about him, but he said enough to set Tom's fears at rest. He declared—not as if he thought Tom had the least interest in the matter, but merely as an item of news—that he would not prosecute Matt for stealing his canoe or tying him to a tree, because he would have enough to answer for when he was brought up for putting that rock on the railroad track. Joe was not revengeful, but he did want to see the squatter punished for that.

It is hardly necessary to add that Tom Bigden breathed easier after his talk with Joe, and when he left the latter at his gate and told him he was glad he and his friends had had an enjoyable run and come safely home, in spite of everybody and everything that had tried to hinder them, the words came from his heart. Tom had been on nettles ever since he read in