"I know your game, Dave Porter! You want to catch me and hand me over to the authorities!" exclaimed Link, and showed more fear than ever.
"Never mind, you're not going to catch me this way! Don't forget, Porton. I'll see you later," and thus speaking, Link Merwell turned and started away on a swift walk. Then, as Dave went after him, he broke into a run, and reaching the roadway, dived into the woods beyond.
"My, my!" came from old Professor Potts. "David, why did he run away?"
"He's afraid of being arrested; that's why, Professor," explained our hero. "Don't you remember, he is one of the villainous fellows who robbed Mr. Wadsworth's jewelry works a year or so ago?"
"Oh, yes, to be sure!" murmured the old gentleman. "I remember now. What an awful thing for a young man like that to be such a criminal!"
"You say he is a criminal?" asked Ward Porton, curiously.
"Hum! I didn't know that," returned the young moving-picture actor, and for the moment looked quite thoughtful.
"May I ask what brought you to Crumville?" queried our hero. "I thought you and your company were bound for Boston."
"We did go to Boston, and the company is there now, unless it has gone up into the woods. I had a little business in this vicinity, and so I came here before going on the next trip with them."
"Did you come to Crumville with Merwell?"
"I did, but I didn't know he was a criminal."
"Then you must have met Merwell in Boston?"
[Illustration: THEN, AS DAVE WENT AFTER HIM, HE BROKE INTO A RUN.--_Page 63._]
"The steam yacht! Do you mean the one that caught fire?"
"Then Link Merwell was on board that vessel?" cried Dave, in added wonder.
"He was. Mr. Appleby, our manager, took him on the day before we went on the trip. I don't know where Mr. Appleby met him."
"That certainly beats the Dutch! Of course, Merwell must have seen me and my friends in the rowboat."
"He took good pains to keep out of sight!"
"I don't know anything about that, Porter. But he was on the boat, you can take my word for that."
"And is he a regular member of your company?"
"He is to be, provided he can make good at the business. I think he came to Mr. Appleby with some sort of a hard-luck story, and the manager said he would give him a chance. Privately, though, I don't think he's very much of an actor. But then you know, a fellow has got to do something for a living."