express drew to a stop less than a hundred feet from the fire. Four masked men leaped from the bush. They were armed with rifles. Behind the express cars a brakeman’s lantern gleamed as the trainman stepped out to see why the . train had stopped. Two quick shots from a rifle drove him back into the train. The masked men were now hammering at the closed doors of the Dominion Express Company’s cars. The express messengers had slammed the doors and locked them as soon as they felt the train slowing down. The bandits shouted threats and curses but the clerks would not open the doors. The bandit in the engine cab waved one of his big guns. “All right. Get down out of here. You bring that coal pick,” he ordered the fire- man. REGISTERED Matt HIDDEN Number 97 carried four express and mail cars. In the fourth car behind the engine, Mail Clerk McCrae heard the shouting and then the dull thud of the pick as it smashed against the panelling of the car ahead. He seized a pouch of registered mail and hid it beneath other stuff. He had just finished when he heard a heavy pounding on the door of his car. “Open up there or we'll blow you to hell,” one of the bandits roared. G. P. TINKER & CO. LTD. REAL ESTATE RENTALS GENERAL INSURANCE e Prince Rupert, B.C. HOTEL PRINCE RUPERT AGNES A. ROCHESTER, Manageress Headquarters for All Mining Men, Tourists and ~ Commercial Travellers Prince Rupert, B. C. Lee Hung Chung CHOP SUEY HOUSE Prince Rupert, B. C. GRAND CAFE Special Lighting Everything Attractive, Fresh and Up-to-the- Minute. Everything Designed for Comfort, Con- venience and Prompt Service. Phone 25 Corner of Second Ave. and Sixth St. PRINCE RUPERT, B. C. Page Fifty-two “Blow away,” McCrae shouted. He heard a series of curses and the scratch of a match. If these men were determined to get into that car, McCrae thought, there was nothing he could do to stop them. Be- sides, the mail was hidden. He threw the door open. A big man, his face masked with a red bandana, climbed into the car and shut the door behind him. “Where is it?” he demanded, waving his gun. “There’s nothing here stuff,” McCrae replied. The bandit went from sack to sack. “Where’s your registered mail?” “There isn’t any. It went on Number Five,” McCrae returned. The bandit cursed and jumped from the car. McCrae, not caring to risk being shot, stayed in the car. The other masked men had smashed the sides in on three of the cars. They saw nothing in them of any value. There were no padlocked steel boxes such as the ex- press company use to ship valuables in. The fireman stood near the couplings. One of the bandits was covering him with a revolver. “Do you want me to break the coup- lings?” the fireman asked. “No, we don’t do things like Bill Miner,” was the snapped reply. “We can hold up a train as she stands.” Three express cars had been smashed in and the mail car entered, but the bandits had obtained no loot. Their leader after threatening death to anyone who tried to follow, ordered his men to the side of the track, where they mounted horses and gal- loped off into the mountains. A few min- utes later the train was on its way in to Kamloops, the third C. P. R. train to be held up in two years. Long before daylight, a large heavily armed posse had left Kamloops, under the direction of Chief Constable W. L. “Bill” Fernie, of the British Columbia Police, who had tracked and captured the Miner gang. They left on a special train and were soon at the scene of the crime. Indian trackers fanned out on the trail of four horses. Detectives and special investigators des- cended on Kamloops. Pinkerton men came from Seattle and other officers from Spo- kane. There was little doubt about the holdup being the work of an American gang. The question was, who was the leader. The train crew were closely questioned. None of them could give an adequate des- cription of the men other than they were all big men and seemed to know their busi- ness. They were cool at all times. ‘Chey acted as if they were old hands at the game. This alone should have been a valuable clue. Train robbers were rapidly going out of style and their numbers had been thinned by time and the law. It had been thought that Bill Miner might have been mixed up in it, but this theory was discounted after the train crew had examined several pic- tures of Miner. Days passed. The trackers had lost the but ordinary trail. They back-tracked and started out once more. This time they learned that the bandits had taken a boat and crossed Shu- swap Lake. Posses were spotted about the country to cut off every avenue of escape. The spe- cial investigators now began to gather in their evidence. They learned that four saddle horses had been stolen from the Pioneer Poultry Ranch near Kamloops. These were the horses used in the escape. They were later found wandering in the bush. Other investigators had discovered that four men had been seen around Senator Bostock’s ranch not far from Kamloops. A day or so before the robbery they had left and investigation showed that they had purchased a large quantity of canned goods, rifle and revolver ammunition and other supplies. Strangely enough, though these men had been working around the ranch, nobody could give an accurate des- cription of them. All information, it seemed, was coming piecemeal. One man swore that the lead- er was Bill Miner. Conductor Sam Elli- ott, who was in charge of Number 97, denied this emphatically. “Why are you so sure of that, Mr. Elliott?” an investigator asked. “Because I saw these men and none of them were Bill Miner.” M. T. LEE TAILORS Ladies’ and Gents’ High Class Tailoring Imported English, Scotch and Irish Tweeds and Woollen Goods Always in Stock 303 THIRD AVE. PRINCE RUPERT, B. C. Phone 6960 P.O. Box 975 A. MacKENZIE FURNITURE LIMITED A. MacKenzie, Proprietor COMPLETE HOME FURNISHINGS Phone 775 Prince Rupert, B. C. MITCHELL and CURRIE Builders and Contractors Shop and Office: 125 East Third Avenue Prince Rupert, B. C. MUSSALLEM’S ECONOMY STORE GROCERIES, FRESH FRUIT, VEGETABLES Boat and Mail Orders Given Careful Attention 317-19 3rd Avenue PRINCE RUPERT, B. C. | THE SHOULDER STRAP