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hair. “We’ll be back on a train tomorrow. This is just for tonight.”
    â€œBut
after
the train, we’ll be in California, right? Where we can stay?” His voice became scratchier. “It doesn’t even have to be California, as long as . . .”
    â€œHarold,” Frances said in her
hush-up
tone, “wherever we go, I’ll be here. With you.”
    â€œOkay.” And in another few moments he was asleep.
    Still feeling the motion of the train in her limbs and wondering again about the treasure at the end of Ned’s instructions, Frances soon drifted off, too. She dreamed about houses with eyes and founding fathers who turned to mush.
    When Jack’s voice woke her up, she could see morning light through the doorway of the shed. She looked around at the others sleeping. Somehow the floor of the shed seemed less crowded than it had been last night. Were all the boys sleeping outside?
    But Jack was already up and standing. And shouting.
    â€œWake up!” he cried. “There’s only seven of us here. Who’s missing?”

6
    I NSIDE THE DEPOT
    T hree boys were gone: Quentin, Lorenzo, and George. And there was a note, from Quentin.
    Jack had found it held down by a rock in the corner of the shed that Quentin had claimed the night before. The paper was thick and appeared to have been torn out of a book. Frances brought over her old
Third Eclectic Reader
and showed him where Quentin must have torn the flyleaf out. “Guess he borrowed my pencil, too,” she said.
    Jack was reading the words over and over again, written in a wobbly script:
    Dear Jack & ever one,
    Enzo & me are gone to hop a train somewhere. Ned told us lots about the hobo life & it sounds real good. He say hoboes work sometimes picking fruit but you can leave anytime you dont like it. Want some pocket money & nobody telling us whats what. Be sides I feel real bad about all you haveing to leave Wandervill cause of me & maybe better if I go.
    Enzo say bye & thanks too.
Tin Whistle & Enzo
    Sarah grabbed the note. “But where’s George?” she said. “He’s gone as well! The note doesn’t mention him.”
    By now Anka and Nicky and Harold were awake and had gathered around, and Alexander was pacing back and forth by the rail yard fence.
    â€œDid anyone hear them leave? Anyone see anything?” he asked.
    Jack felt sunk. All he’d wanted to do was bring the kids at the Pratcherd ranch to Wanderville, but when that had failed, he was glad that at least Quentin had joined them. Wasn’t it better to stay together?
    Just then Harold spoke up. “I know something,” he said in a small voice. “I-I didn’t see Quentin and Lorenzo. They were gone when I woke up. But . . . I know where George is. . . .”
    â€œ
Where
, Harold?” Frances snapped.
    Harold looked over in the direction of the depot building, which loomed in the near distance like a castle with its tower and pointed gables and turrets. “He said he was going to get some candy,” he mumbled. “Like the kind he had when his train stopped here before.”
    â€œOh, no,” Jack said. “He’ll be caught for sure if he tries to steal here in Kansas City.” His stomach lurched as another thought came to him, too: What if Sheriff Routh had sent out word that they were runaways?
    Alexander seemed to be thinking the same thing. “Let’s hope that they aren’t already looking for kids on the loose.” Turning to Jack, he added, “You and me had better go find him.”
    â€œWe’re
all
going,” Frances declared. “Remember what Ned said about the town cops in the depot. What if they caught you, too? Then we’d never know what happened.”
    â€œGood idea,” Jack said.
    Alexander, meanwhile, obviously didn’t agree, judging from the way he quickened his pace to walk ahead of the other six kids as they