car behind like the closed delivery wagons Glen had seen in town. Bright colored letters announced to the world that J. Jervice supplied the public with a full line of novelties, including rugs, curtains, rare laces and Jervice's Live Stock Condition Powders.

"Can I help you," volunteered Glen. It is worthy of note that the service was freely offered before the man spoke so much as a word. It had not been Glen's habit to volunteer help. He was feeling the influence of the home he had just left.

The offer was not kindly received. The man's reply was so churlish as to leave open the suspicion that he was not naturally a man of pleasant ways.

"Garn away f'm here," he snarled. "I don't need no boys spyin' around my car."

"Who's spyin'?" asked Glen defiantly. "You seem to need somebody pretty bad. You ain't man enough to strip that tire off."

"Nor nobody else wouldn't be," declared the man. "Leastways nobody with jest one pair of hands. While I pry it off one end it slips back on the other. Are you strong?" he asked, stopping to look at Glen.

"I'm pretty stout for my age," admitted Glen, modestly, "but I don't want to help nor spy, if you don't want me."

"I could use another pair of hands," the peddler admitted. "I can't pay you nothing for it, though, unless it be a ride to town."

"That is just what I want," agreed Glen. "It's a bargain."

The perspiration of Mr. J. Jervice had not been without occasion. The tire he was trying to change had done good service—it was, in fact, the very first tire that wheel had ever carried. Perhaps it cherished fond hopes of remaining in service as long as the wheel to which it clung—at least it resisted most strenuously all efforts to detach it. Both Glen and the man were moist with their efforts before it came away, and they accumulated still more dirt and moisture in applying its successor. But at last it was all done, and Glen had already mounted to the seat, while his companion was putting away his tools, when a cart drove up alongside and Glen recognized in the driver, Mr. Gates.

"What's the matter?" he asked, as Mr. Gates pulled up his horse.

"What's the matter?" echoed Mr. J. Jervice; "this boy been doing anything?"

It was not an unnatural question for there was something in Mr. Gates's look and in Glen's questioning tone that betokened affairs out of the ordinary; furthermore, Mr. J. Jervice seemed to be so suspicious of people in general that one might well think he had something to conceal.

"The boy's all right," replied Mr. Gates. "I have something to say to him, that's all. If he will come over here we will drive on a few feet while I say it."

Glen's thoughts flew back to the folded newspaper and he was instantly suspicious.

"I don't want to get down," he said. "This gentleman's agreed to give me a ride to town and I don't want to keep him."

"But I want you to stay," replied Mr. Gates. "I will take you to town if you wish, but first I want you to go back home with me and I will tell you something important."

Glen felt one of his old, unrestrained passions rising within him.

"I know what you want," he cried. "I saw the newspaper. You want to send me back to the reform school."

"I want to help you make a man of yourself," asserted Mr. Gates, unmoved by the boy's passion. "It's true I want you to go back to the school, but I will go with you and speak for you. You must go back because it is the only right way out. Let me tell you, Glen, you will never get over a trouble by running away from it. The manly and Christian thing to do is to go back. And that is why I want you to do it."

"And of course you don't want the reward of ten dollars that's always paid for returning a boy. You wouldn't take the money, would you?"

If the eyes of Mr. Gates were saddened by this mean sneer those of Mr. J. Jervice were not. They lightened with a sudden interest, and he jumped into the battle for the first time.

"This boy's a goin' with me," he told Mr. Gates. "He's earned a ride and I promised it and I'm a man of my word. You be off, now, and leave him alone."

"You are spoiling his best chance," said Mr. Gates. "I am not interested in the school or the reward. I am simply trying to do my duty to the boy."

"Well, you've done it," cried Mr. J. Jervice, as his car gathered headway. "Good-by to ye."

He turned to Glen as the car got into its speed.

"So you've run away from the reform school, eh? And he was goin' to make ten dollars taking you back?"

"Oh, he didn't want the ten dollars," said Glen, his rage all gone. "He treated me awful fine while I was at his house. I just said that because I was mad. But he can't get me to go back; nor nobody else unless they tie me up first."

"I don't know?" said Mr. J. Jervice. "Ten dollars is pretty near a week's pay for most men."

"That wouldn't make any difference with him," said Glen. "He's straight as a string."

Mr. Gates would have been gratified to know how deep an impression his Christian character had made on this boy who had flouted his kindness.

Mr. J. Jervice was not inclined to conversation—he was puzzling over a problem something akin to that of the fox and the geese (he to be the fox). So they drove along in comparative silence until, topping a hill, Glen exclaimed at the sight of the buildings of a large town.

"Are we almost there?" he asked.

"About three miles yet," said Mr. J. Jervice. "What you going to do when we get there?"

"I'm not sure, but I think I'd better leave you before we get to town. I don't believe Mr. Gates would telephone the police but somebody else might."

"You can ride with me a couple o' miles yet. Tell ye what ye can do. S'pose'n you get inside. There's lots o' room and there's a ventilator back o' this seat will give ye air. You be real careful and not go fussing around disturbing things. There's things there I wouldn't want ye to touch."

It seemed a good idea. Mr. J. Jervice unlocked the doors in the back and Glen stepped inside. The doors slammed behind him and he heard the heavy steel bar drop into its slots. Then he heard something like a laugh—a foxy laugh. Why should Mr. J. Jervice laugh? At once his suspicions were awakened.

As Mr. J. Jervice climbed to his seat again Glen shouted to him through the ventilator.

"Stop," he shouted. "I've changed my mind. I don't like being in here and I believe I'll take my chance with you on the front seat."

Mr. J. Jervice paid no attention.

The treachery of Mr. J. Jervice was now very clear. He had decided that he himself would hand Glen over to the authorities and receive the ten dollars reward. Since Glen was almost as big as he, there had been some question how he should restrain the boy. He thought this all settled by his clever scheme, and the ten dollars practically in his pocket. No wonder he chuckled.

But it is well for those who cage wild animals to be sure that the cage is properly prepared. Glen looked around in the gloom of the car. He knew it was useless to bump against those solid doors. The way out lay through Mr. J. Jervice, and the time for getting out was very brief. On a shelf lay a bundle of sticks. He pulled on one and found on the other end a flag. It was an emblem. The flag should bring him freedom.

Glen found that the flag stick would just poke through the ventilator railing. Being effectively poked it struck Mr. J. Jervice neatly in the back