Buffalo. He stayed at Cleveland, but Bill was setting his traps along the line. As soon as it was supposed that the pursuit had been abandoned, George and Clara were started east along the line, with a sharp look-out ahead. The spies had been outwitted, and the fugitives had passed this point, when a dispatch came along the line (not by telegraph, no wires had then been put up), that all the crossings at Buffalo, Black Rock and Niagara Falls, were unsafe.
They were then hidden away until an opportunity offered to smuggle them, in disguise, on to a steamboat at her first stopping place on her way from Buffalo to Detroit. When the boat came to the dock it was 10 o’clock in the evening, and when the crew commenced “wooding up,” two new hands, dressed as sailors, came from among the wood piles, and though somewhat awkward, they worked with all their might, and when the wood was all loaded, they went aboard with the sailors, and were soon on their way.
Meanwhile, Bill Shea, Curtis’ accomplice, having been baffled, had returned to Cleveland to consult with Curtis. They decided to abandon the pursuit, and take the first boat for Sandusky, thence by stage to Cincinnati. The boat on which our fugitives had taken passage was one of the finest side-wheel steamers on the lake, commanded by Captain Titus, a very popular captain, and the same who was in command of the Erie when she was burned off Silver Creek. The boat stopped at Cleveland for passengers, and just as she was starting off, Curtis and Bill came running and jumped on board. When they called at the office to pay their passage to Sandusky, the clerk said, “We do not stop there, we run to Detroit direct.” “Well, Major,” said Bill, “we are in for it, I guess it’s your treat,” and they passed down toward the bar. Bill could never pass anybody without looking to
