A Mystery of the Rails

Attempting to prevent an armed robbery in the paymaster's office, Helen is bound and gagged, and the thieves escape on a hand car. With her feet still bound by wire, Helen endeavors to pursue on foot, but stumbles and falls across the rails of the track of an oncoming train.

An action movie serial that premiered in 1924

Brent, the night operator has been knocked unconscious by a piece of lumber projecting from a passing freight, and has been rendered temporarily insane. Meantime, a furious storm arises, a track walker discovers a washout and wires a warning to Helen, who sets the danger signal for the Limited which is due in ten minutes.

Red Stanley's band has successfully robbed the express car and the members are making good their escape when they come upon Helen and her girl chum riding in the woods. The girls are set upon but they succeed by desperate riding in making their escape temporarily and, when danger seems near again, are saved by the approaching railroad detectives searching for the Stanley band. A running fight results in the capture of one of the band, but Stanley and his chief aide escape. Under cover of darkness, as Helen is working alone in the desolate station, the two enter and bind and gag her.

"Red" Byrd and his aides succeed in learning that a large treasure is being shipped on a certain freight car under special guard. They overpower the relief operator at Helen's station and tamper with the signals so that the treasure train stops, while the crew runs ahead to investigate, leaving Spencer alone to guard the treasure.

Chilton, a crooked dealer in antiques, decides on a daring scheme to recoup his finances by defrauding the railroad. A car-load of cheap furniture is shipped with a valuation of $40,000 on it. Blanding, the tool of Chilton and his partner, awaits at Lone Point a telegram giving the number of the car.

Helen, the operator at Hobart, warns her friend Anna, the operator at Montville, that Tim Hudson, a notorious swindler, is headed for Montville. Anna later brings about Hudson's arrest when the man, posing as a minister, attempts to swindle the people of the town.

Lockwood, the old, one-armed flagman at Lone Point, tells Helen and a young soldier of his experiences during the Civil War, and how he lost his arm. The Civil War flashback sequences consist of archive footage from Kalem's Railroad Raiders of '62 (1911), rather than newly filmed footage.

To prevent a three mile journey around the mountain the telegraph wires at the construction camp have been strung over the precipice from the station on the mountain top. The operator is discharged when the superintendent suspects him of treachery and Helen is transferred to the station. Later, after the former operator has enlisted the aid of crooked brokers to use his knowledge in ruining the value of the road's stock, he receives an opportunity to get revenge on the superintendent.

Hanging from a rope over the track, the detective seems certain to plunge to death when the oncoming train splits the knot of the rope which has been tied to a rail and slung over the bridge girder. Helen's presence of mind and nerve in swinging out over the river on the other end of the rope and thus balancing the detective until the train has passed prevents the terrible catastrophe. Later, when pursuing the culprits, Helen once more takes her life in her hands by throwing a lasso from the hand car on which they are pursuing the freight over the brake beam, and then crawling hand over hand to the top of the car.

In the second entry of the popular Hazards of Helen series, Helen, is temporarily assigned as a telegraph operator at Quarry Depot; bad blood springs up between two men who are seeking Helen's favor, but to whom she has remained impartial.