CHAPTER VIIIIN MOST EXCELLENT GOOD SEASONAlmostas he ceased speaking the detective, peering forward, as if not quite certain of the road, it was so dark, placed a detaining hand on Davy’s arm. “Right to one side here and stop,” he said.Without jar or sound, save the slight squeak of a brake, the Big Six came to a halt. The wonder of the Auto Boys was doubled, if such a thing were possible. Another hundred yards would have placed them directly in front of the dwelling of Mr. Peek.“Hehad nothing to do with stealing that car, or ours,” Paul Jones could not refrain from whispering to Billy, at his side.Lost in his own questioning thoughts, Worth did not answer.“Keep right behind me, Philip, the gun inyour right hand and pointed to the ground.” Mr. Rack was out of the car now, and taking Phil by the sleeve as he spoke, that young gentleman also stepped softly down. “If you boys are as quiet as mice,” said the detective to the others, “you will hear me call instructions, should I do so. We may be gone for some time.”In silent wonder the three in the car obeyed the order so gently given, but so imperatively attuned. Without misgiving, but trembling from the multitude of questions rushing to his mind, Way followed Mr. Rack. Walking upright, but without noise, the two approached the dark and lonely farmhouse.Stationing Way behind the trunk of an old apple tree, Mr. Rack left him. For a quarter of an hour he was absent. Vastly to Phil’s surprise he came creeping on hands and knees and was fairly beside the boy ere the latter discovered him.“We are too late, or too early. It will take some time——”A terrific scream burst suddenly on the air. Coming in unexpected violence, and from within the old house, the sound was terrifying beyond description.“Don’t forget the signal!” said Robert Rack calmly.“Close in,” Phil whispered, to show he remembered, but the detective was gone.The seconds seemed like hours to Philip Way and no less so to the three in the car who had heard the frightful scream.Suddenly there came a wild cry, like violent, threatening anger, like the howl of a wolf at bay. And then——“Close in!” It was the voice of Bob Rack, and what a contrast with the other! It might have been a father calling a son to breakfast, so cool, collected, calm it was.Instantly Way rushed forward through the dark.Close in!Yes, but where? How? Soon he found himself groping for the door at the side porch. A feeble light shone from the kitchen. With a crash the door was suddenlyflung open. A heavy figure leaped forth. Phil threw himself forward, arms outstretched, just as many a time he had tackled on the gridiron, and the heavy body went tumbling to the ground beside the doorstep, Way with it, but keeping the uppermost position.“Nicely done, Philip, nicely!” No disturbed note, no ruffled sound, no excitement whatever,—just Bob Rack saying a word or two in his calm and tranquil way, both then and an instant later: “Sit up, Adam! Let him rise, Phil. I think we were here just in good season. You see how Mr. Peek is, Phil,—back there in the front room. You’ll find another lamp in the kitchen, no doubt.”Nothing surprised Phil more, perhaps, than the effect of the detective’s low and even tones upon himself. Though panting for breath, after the recent struggle and his exertion, he noticed that he experienced no sense of fear or apprehension. He found a lamp on a low mantel and lighted it. As he went toward the room adjoining, he heard Mr. Rack call cheerily,“Light up the car, boys! Drive up to the yard here, if you will.”The scene Phil discovered in the front room would have been horrifying but for the calm upon him, to which allusion has just been made. Mr. Peek, dressed as if for work, sat on the edge of the bed, his face covered by his hands while blood stained his fingers and dripped, like the dropping of water, upon the oil-cloth covering the floor.Hastily Way helped the old man to rise. He wanted the outer air he said—his chair near the kitchen door. The lad led him as he wished, then brought water and a towel. Helping himself, then, Mr. Peek bathed an ugly wound above and to the left of his left eyebrow. A revolver in his hand, Mr. Rack sat on the lower steps of the porch. His prisoner sat on the ground before him and the detective had taken the precaution of slipping handcuffs upon him.Billy, Paul and Dave had now arrived upon the scene, but not one ventured a word.“Are you able to ride to town, Mr. Peek?”asked Mr. Rack. “You’ll be so much better there than here.”But no, the old gentleman would not go. He was not much hurt, he said, and would feel perfectly safe to remain alone. “Safer than I have really been for many a day, I don’t doubt,” he added. “But if he had struck the temple, as he surely tried to, he would have killed me,” shuddered the aged farmer. “Lord, I have suffered as I have deserved!”The latter words were low, as if spoken in prayer. Then quite aloud again, “Take him with you. You might drop in to-morrow. Maybe my boys will be out this way.” The latter words were accompanied by a smile. “You and your automobile did good work to-night, boys! However you happened along, I can’t think! And this gentleman with you?”“It’s quite a story, Mr. Peek. I’ll tell you all about it when you’ve rested some,” said Way, holding a lamp, while Billy tied a soft, clean handkerchief over the wound. Worth was gentle and clever as a woman at such things.“Thunder and lightning! It’sPickem!I thought——”Paul’s violent exclamation caused all the boys to look at once to the man on the ground. The dull glow of the lamp had suddenly fallen upon the fellow’s face.“So did I! I thought——”“That it was Coster,” broke in Bob Rack gently. “But it is neither he nor any other than Mr. Adam W. Kull, of Harkville, New York.”“By thunder!Wecalled him Pickem!” cried Paul, in amazement. “How didheget here?”“I think he ran out in his Torpedo. The car stands by the roadside, just above,” said Mr. Rack, pleasantly.
CHAPTER VIII
IN MOST EXCELLENT GOOD SEASON
Almostas he ceased speaking the detective, peering forward, as if not quite certain of the road, it was so dark, placed a detaining hand on Davy’s arm. “Right to one side here and stop,” he said.
Without jar or sound, save the slight squeak of a brake, the Big Six came to a halt. The wonder of the Auto Boys was doubled, if such a thing were possible. Another hundred yards would have placed them directly in front of the dwelling of Mr. Peek.
“Hehad nothing to do with stealing that car, or ours,” Paul Jones could not refrain from whispering to Billy, at his side.
Lost in his own questioning thoughts, Worth did not answer.
“Keep right behind me, Philip, the gun inyour right hand and pointed to the ground.” Mr. Rack was out of the car now, and taking Phil by the sleeve as he spoke, that young gentleman also stepped softly down. “If you boys are as quiet as mice,” said the detective to the others, “you will hear me call instructions, should I do so. We may be gone for some time.”
In silent wonder the three in the car obeyed the order so gently given, but so imperatively attuned. Without misgiving, but trembling from the multitude of questions rushing to his mind, Way followed Mr. Rack. Walking upright, but without noise, the two approached the dark and lonely farmhouse.
Stationing Way behind the trunk of an old apple tree, Mr. Rack left him. For a quarter of an hour he was absent. Vastly to Phil’s surprise he came creeping on hands and knees and was fairly beside the boy ere the latter discovered him.
“We are too late, or too early. It will take some time——”
A terrific scream burst suddenly on the air. Coming in unexpected violence, and from within the old house, the sound was terrifying beyond description.
“Don’t forget the signal!” said Robert Rack calmly.
“Close in,” Phil whispered, to show he remembered, but the detective was gone.
The seconds seemed like hours to Philip Way and no less so to the three in the car who had heard the frightful scream.
Suddenly there came a wild cry, like violent, threatening anger, like the howl of a wolf at bay. And then——
“Close in!” It was the voice of Bob Rack, and what a contrast with the other! It might have been a father calling a son to breakfast, so cool, collected, calm it was.
Instantly Way rushed forward through the dark.Close in!Yes, but where? How? Soon he found himself groping for the door at the side porch. A feeble light shone from the kitchen. With a crash the door was suddenlyflung open. A heavy figure leaped forth. Phil threw himself forward, arms outstretched, just as many a time he had tackled on the gridiron, and the heavy body went tumbling to the ground beside the doorstep, Way with it, but keeping the uppermost position.
“Nicely done, Philip, nicely!” No disturbed note, no ruffled sound, no excitement whatever,—just Bob Rack saying a word or two in his calm and tranquil way, both then and an instant later: “Sit up, Adam! Let him rise, Phil. I think we were here just in good season. You see how Mr. Peek is, Phil,—back there in the front room. You’ll find another lamp in the kitchen, no doubt.”
Nothing surprised Phil more, perhaps, than the effect of the detective’s low and even tones upon himself. Though panting for breath, after the recent struggle and his exertion, he noticed that he experienced no sense of fear or apprehension. He found a lamp on a low mantel and lighted it. As he went toward the room adjoining, he heard Mr. Rack call cheerily,“Light up the car, boys! Drive up to the yard here, if you will.”
The scene Phil discovered in the front room would have been horrifying but for the calm upon him, to which allusion has just been made. Mr. Peek, dressed as if for work, sat on the edge of the bed, his face covered by his hands while blood stained his fingers and dripped, like the dropping of water, upon the oil-cloth covering the floor.
Hastily Way helped the old man to rise. He wanted the outer air he said—his chair near the kitchen door. The lad led him as he wished, then brought water and a towel. Helping himself, then, Mr. Peek bathed an ugly wound above and to the left of his left eyebrow. A revolver in his hand, Mr. Rack sat on the lower steps of the porch. His prisoner sat on the ground before him and the detective had taken the precaution of slipping handcuffs upon him.
Billy, Paul and Dave had now arrived upon the scene, but not one ventured a word.
“Are you able to ride to town, Mr. Peek?”asked Mr. Rack. “You’ll be so much better there than here.”
But no, the old gentleman would not go. He was not much hurt, he said, and would feel perfectly safe to remain alone. “Safer than I have really been for many a day, I don’t doubt,” he added. “But if he had struck the temple, as he surely tried to, he would have killed me,” shuddered the aged farmer. “Lord, I have suffered as I have deserved!”
The latter words were low, as if spoken in prayer. Then quite aloud again, “Take him with you. You might drop in to-morrow. Maybe my boys will be out this way.” The latter words were accompanied by a smile. “You and your automobile did good work to-night, boys! However you happened along, I can’t think! And this gentleman with you?”
“It’s quite a story, Mr. Peek. I’ll tell you all about it when you’ve rested some,” said Way, holding a lamp, while Billy tied a soft, clean handkerchief over the wound. Worth was gentle and clever as a woman at such things.
“Thunder and lightning! It’sPickem!I thought——”
Paul’s violent exclamation caused all the boys to look at once to the man on the ground. The dull glow of the lamp had suddenly fallen upon the fellow’s face.
“So did I! I thought——”
“That it was Coster,” broke in Bob Rack gently. “But it is neither he nor any other than Mr. Adam W. Kull, of Harkville, New York.”
“By thunder!Wecalled him Pickem!” cried Paul, in amazement. “How didheget here?”
“I think he ran out in his Torpedo. The car stands by the roadside, just above,” said Mr. Rack, pleasantly.
CHAPTER IXTHE DETECTIVE’S STRANGE STORYDetectiveBob Rack and his prisoner, with Phil to drive, went to Griffin in the Torpedo while Paul, Billy, Dave and Mr. Peek rode in the Six. For Mr. Rack would hardly consent to the old gentleman spending the remainder of the night alone. So, in due time, was he given a room at the American House. Mr. Pickem, otherwise Smith, otherwise Kull, was assigned to very narrow and also strong, quarters in the village prison with Chief Fobes personally mounting guard over both him and Coster. Two big revolvers the officer had and there was no sign of sleep in his usually languid eyes.The capture of the chief’s prisoner was, vastly to his satisfaction, effected by himselfand the village night watchman. On the advice of Bob Rack they had watched the railroad yards closely. Coster was seized just as he darted from some hiding-place and tried to board an out-bound freight.Deeply interested in the exciting occurrences of the evening, Landlord Wagg had not gone to bed, as proved quite fortunate for the Auto Boys and the detective. When Mr. Peek had been given every attention, he announced that a little supper for five was ready to serve whenever wanted.“I rarely venture an opinion without having facts to support it,” said Mr. Rack, smiling, “but on this occasion I will say that I think all of us are ready to show our appreciation of such an invitation in a very thorough manner, provided you will join us, Mr. Wagg. Also I’ve promised the boys a little history of the case that brought us together. Perhaps you may be interested.”A large part of the story told by Mr. Bob Rack as the party sat long over a supper ofcold meats, bread and butter, coffee and fruit, is familiar to the reader. Without quoting his language then,—and the pleasing modulations of his voice could not be shown in print, in any event,—the narrative was substantially as follows:When the theft of Adam Kull’s car, at Harkville, was reported to the authorities two months earlier, Mr. Rack had been asked by the insurance company, in which a policy covering theft was held, to assist in the search.Not a trace of the car was found. There seemed to be no clue to go upon. An odd circumstance which, though it apparently had no connection with the case, yet which Mr. Rack was unwilling to dismiss wholly from his mind, was the fact that a few days earlier Mr. Kull had purchased from a neighbor and shipped to a middle western city a fine Scotch collie. The dog was greatly attached to the automobile, and had sometimes been allowed to ride. This simple fact in itself was not important; but the purchase of the dog, apparently for the merepurpose of giving the animal away, was not in keeping with Mr. Kull’s usual disposition.From so trifling a cause for suspicion the detective was unwilling to make even a hint as to what was in his mind. All he could do, and the thing he did do, was to place a watch upon Adam Kull while secretly he made a thorough search of the man’s record.Among other things it was found that, as a young man, Kull had been a party to a transaction by which he and his mother obtained a strange hold upon a wealthy farmer near Griffin, Henry Peek by name. The woman married Mr. Peek but they soon separated. To be free of the woman and her son, Mr. Peek had entered into a written contract involving the payment of a large sum of money at once, and the further stipulation that, should the wife survive the husband, she should receive the entire Peek estate. If, on the other hand, Mr. Peek survived his one-time wife, the estate should ultimately go to his heirs alone, and no heir of hers should be considered as having anyclaim whatever upon the property. The bargain seemed a very good one for the woman as she was much younger than Mr. Peek.Years passed. Mrs. Peek, who had resumed her former name, Kull, lived with her only son and they had eventually settled in Harkville. Here the man was engaged in real estate, a number of shady deals being credited to him in that connection.Within a few months of the present time, the mother, though but little past middle age, had been stricken by an incurable disease. The son could not have failed to remember that, unless she survived his former step-father, the rich Peek estate would not descend to him.Matters were at this pass when Detective Rack obtained his first extended knowledge of Kull, following his investigation of the disappearance of the automobile the latter had owned. Several weeks slipped by and, as the man under scrutiny had made no movement which would in any way strengthen suspicionagainst him, the watching of his going and his coming was relaxed.One day, nearly two months after the theft of Kull’s car, a strange man called on the real estate dealer, later left his office, and was not seen afterward. Mr. Rack’s men discovered the fellow to be a worthless, discharged employe of a motor concern in Rochester. His name was Coster.It was but a day or two later that Kull suddenly left home. Later it was learned he was in Griffin, registered at the American hotel under an assumed name.“And it was at that time, undoubtedly,” said Mr. Rack, “that, having taken the Torpedo from wherever it was concealed, Coster was on the way west with it. Kull was in Griffin to meet him. He visited the old farm where he had once lived for a short time. He carried the planks over the hill to the icehouse, that his friend might readily run the Torpedo down the embankment and so into that building. There are some links missing as to this assertion butit will be found substantially correct when the details are known. For it was certainly the intention that the Torpedo should be placed in this new and more distant hiding-place. Kull had purchased a supply of Fielderson’s automobile and carriage paint. He mentioned to a clerk in the store that he was going to use the material on an old surrey he had. He owned no such vehicle. Hence my conclusion, at this time, that the paint was to be used in a further concealment of the identity of the Torpedo.“Again I heard from Harkville that Kull, after a brief stay at home, following his having been in Griffin, was once more out of town. I was busy with other matters and did not immediately take up the threads of the case again. I was about to do so yesterday,” and here Mr. Rack smiled toward Mr. Wagg, who sat with eyes and mouth open, his glasses perched on the very top of his bald head,—“when Mr. Phil and Mr. David, here, came in upon me, introduced by one of our best young lawyers. They were in possession of so much informationthat, dovetailing their statements with my own previous knowledge, I had a fairly perfect fabric of fact. From this it was simply a little study to deduce practically certain probabilities. However, I spent a few hours piecing out and verifying my threads of information. I found that Kull’s poor mother could probably live but a few days or weeks, at most. I found a man named Coster had been locked up for intoxication here in Griffin, that he was first seen in town on Saturday and his clothing was splashed with mud. Friday was a rainy day, you will remember. By the merest chance my Harkville representative also learned yesterday that Kull had purchased some saws for cutting steel before leaving town on Tuesday. He had bought a ticket for Batavia, but that was no certain sign that he would not stop off in Griffin.“To see through the man’s entire plan now is, of course, like reading it in print. All that we do not know is just how Coster happened to lose the Torpedo, then pick up the car of ourfriends here, which certainly he did. That we will learn later. The point I would bring to your notice now is that Kull, whatever his first plan may have been, changed somewhat his course of action as he found circumstances favoring him. He had learned of Coster reaching Griffin in an intoxicated condition and being locked up. He enabled him to escape by passing saws in to him by means of a long stick put between the bars of the rear corridor window, which was open. This he did last night, Mr. Fobes believes, and he probably is correct.“It is an interesting fact, but not a strange one, for usually it is the small thing that trips the criminal up,—an interesting fact, observe, that the dog Kull had been at such pains to be rid of in Harkville, lest it innocently betray the spot where his car had been concealed, had appeared here in Griffin to trouble him. To regain possession of the Torpedo (after having failed to get it placed in a barn where he could more easily get at it) Kull found it necessary to kill the Scotch collie. This he did on Sundaynight. It was also desirable that Mr. Creek be placed beyond power to hinder. An anonymous telephone call from Port Greeley, summoning him there, did the work nicely.“Now we come to the circumstance that Kull believed so especially favored him—Coster breaking jail, the Torpedo disappearing, poor old Mr. Peek assaulted and killed—all this in one night. Where would suspicion naturally point? To Coster, certainly.”Mr. Rack smiled and paused.“Wonderful!” exclaimed Mr. Wagg.“Not at all. The boys deserve more credit than I. And we found so much additional information the moment we reached Griffin to-night, that the veriest novice could hardly go wrong. Billy had Coster’s measure from boots up. Fobes knew nothing except that he was able to tell me that Creek telephoned to him from Port Greeley, stating that there was deception in his being summoned to that town, and asking him to watch the garage, which, by the way, he did not do. The time was shortand the only particle of credit we deserve is for having moved at once and quickly.“The time was short for Kull to act if he was to take advantage of favoring circumstances,—that is apparent now and it was before. It required no great mental power to see that at a glance. Where Kull would be found was thus easily determined. And, fortunately, we arrived in time. On my first survey of the Peek place I found nothing but the Torpedo, partially concealed behind some trees by the roadside and every light extinguished. Kull could not be far away but I hesitated lest it should prove that, having not yet entered the house, he should discover that he was watched. The facts were, he was in the house when we reached the place. He was waiting to be sure his victim slept. I flashed a light upon him as he was in the act of striking his first blow and possibly that was why he struck to one side of the temple and only a flesh wound resulted. I seized his arms but he escaped me. I fear Imight have been obliged to shoot to frighten him, if nothing more, but for Phil’s very able and timely help.”“But what isyouridea as to the reason this fellow Coster left one car in the road and hid another in the icehouse in place of it?” Mr. Wagg inquired.“One of two things—Coster left the car to look about the Peek place, either knowing or suspecting Kull’s ultimate plan of making away with the old gentleman, and in his absence the machine was in some manner started forward. Or, and I think more probably, Coster was drunk and fell from the Torpedo as he saw another car approaching on that unfrequented road where he did not expect to see, and had no wish to see, any other traveler. And now, perhaps, we would better bid one another goodnight,” Mr. Rack concluded.“Might as well make it good-morning,” grinned Paul Jones, stepping to a window, “it’s nearly daylight.”The following day Coster made a complete confession to Mr. Rack. The latter’s idea of the entire plans of Kull were substantially correct. About the abandonment of the Torpedo, Coster said he had been drinking a great deal and, contrary to his usual experience, the more he drank the more he feared for his own safety in the car he knew police and detectives had made prolonged search to find. Seeing a large, six-cylinder machine come rapidly over a hill toward him, and on that lonely road where he had been assured he would see no one whomsoever, he suddenly lost his head. He leaped headlong from the Torpedo into the bushes at the roadside. Later he had crept forward and, from the hillside, watched all that the Auto Boys did until they went away in the empty car. Then he put their machine in the icehouse, guided no doubt by the drunken notion that he was very considerably the gainer. But instead of sobering up and meeting Kull at the American House, as had been agreed he should do, he spent the night in a barn and proceeded to getdrunk again the moment he reached the town in the morning.“It appears,” said Bob Rack, telling the boys, Chief Fobes (who was still in a perfect fever of wonder and excitement) and Willie Creek the substance of Coster’s confession, the day following Kull’s capture,—“It appears that our Harkville friend concealed his car several days before he pried the padlock off his garage and reported the machine to have been stolen. He had hidden the machine in an unused garage attached to a summer hotel a few miles from the town. Coster obtained it there. Knowing the case as I do now, I would venture to believe that it was the apparent success of his first crime, in defrauding the insurance people, that nerved Kull to carry out his plan further, and so led to the attempt on the life of old Mr. Peek. His plans were clever, after a crude fashion, but he made the mistake every criminal makes sooner or later, in the belief he apparently entertained that deception could be covered up. In the long run thereis no such thing. Even Coster may be truthful when he declares he did not know Kull had defrauded the insurance company.”
CHAPTER IX
THE DETECTIVE’S STRANGE STORY
DetectiveBob Rack and his prisoner, with Phil to drive, went to Griffin in the Torpedo while Paul, Billy, Dave and Mr. Peek rode in the Six. For Mr. Rack would hardly consent to the old gentleman spending the remainder of the night alone. So, in due time, was he given a room at the American House. Mr. Pickem, otherwise Smith, otherwise Kull, was assigned to very narrow and also strong, quarters in the village prison with Chief Fobes personally mounting guard over both him and Coster. Two big revolvers the officer had and there was no sign of sleep in his usually languid eyes.
The capture of the chief’s prisoner was, vastly to his satisfaction, effected by himselfand the village night watchman. On the advice of Bob Rack they had watched the railroad yards closely. Coster was seized just as he darted from some hiding-place and tried to board an out-bound freight.
Deeply interested in the exciting occurrences of the evening, Landlord Wagg had not gone to bed, as proved quite fortunate for the Auto Boys and the detective. When Mr. Peek had been given every attention, he announced that a little supper for five was ready to serve whenever wanted.
“I rarely venture an opinion without having facts to support it,” said Mr. Rack, smiling, “but on this occasion I will say that I think all of us are ready to show our appreciation of such an invitation in a very thorough manner, provided you will join us, Mr. Wagg. Also I’ve promised the boys a little history of the case that brought us together. Perhaps you may be interested.”
A large part of the story told by Mr. Bob Rack as the party sat long over a supper ofcold meats, bread and butter, coffee and fruit, is familiar to the reader. Without quoting his language then,—and the pleasing modulations of his voice could not be shown in print, in any event,—the narrative was substantially as follows:
When the theft of Adam Kull’s car, at Harkville, was reported to the authorities two months earlier, Mr. Rack had been asked by the insurance company, in which a policy covering theft was held, to assist in the search.
Not a trace of the car was found. There seemed to be no clue to go upon. An odd circumstance which, though it apparently had no connection with the case, yet which Mr. Rack was unwilling to dismiss wholly from his mind, was the fact that a few days earlier Mr. Kull had purchased from a neighbor and shipped to a middle western city a fine Scotch collie. The dog was greatly attached to the automobile, and had sometimes been allowed to ride. This simple fact in itself was not important; but the purchase of the dog, apparently for the merepurpose of giving the animal away, was not in keeping with Mr. Kull’s usual disposition.
From so trifling a cause for suspicion the detective was unwilling to make even a hint as to what was in his mind. All he could do, and the thing he did do, was to place a watch upon Adam Kull while secretly he made a thorough search of the man’s record.
Among other things it was found that, as a young man, Kull had been a party to a transaction by which he and his mother obtained a strange hold upon a wealthy farmer near Griffin, Henry Peek by name. The woman married Mr. Peek but they soon separated. To be free of the woman and her son, Mr. Peek had entered into a written contract involving the payment of a large sum of money at once, and the further stipulation that, should the wife survive the husband, she should receive the entire Peek estate. If, on the other hand, Mr. Peek survived his one-time wife, the estate should ultimately go to his heirs alone, and no heir of hers should be considered as having anyclaim whatever upon the property. The bargain seemed a very good one for the woman as she was much younger than Mr. Peek.
Years passed. Mrs. Peek, who had resumed her former name, Kull, lived with her only son and they had eventually settled in Harkville. Here the man was engaged in real estate, a number of shady deals being credited to him in that connection.
Within a few months of the present time, the mother, though but little past middle age, had been stricken by an incurable disease. The son could not have failed to remember that, unless she survived his former step-father, the rich Peek estate would not descend to him.
Matters were at this pass when Detective Rack obtained his first extended knowledge of Kull, following his investigation of the disappearance of the automobile the latter had owned. Several weeks slipped by and, as the man under scrutiny had made no movement which would in any way strengthen suspicionagainst him, the watching of his going and his coming was relaxed.
One day, nearly two months after the theft of Kull’s car, a strange man called on the real estate dealer, later left his office, and was not seen afterward. Mr. Rack’s men discovered the fellow to be a worthless, discharged employe of a motor concern in Rochester. His name was Coster.
It was but a day or two later that Kull suddenly left home. Later it was learned he was in Griffin, registered at the American hotel under an assumed name.
“And it was at that time, undoubtedly,” said Mr. Rack, “that, having taken the Torpedo from wherever it was concealed, Coster was on the way west with it. Kull was in Griffin to meet him. He visited the old farm where he had once lived for a short time. He carried the planks over the hill to the icehouse, that his friend might readily run the Torpedo down the embankment and so into that building. There are some links missing as to this assertion butit will be found substantially correct when the details are known. For it was certainly the intention that the Torpedo should be placed in this new and more distant hiding-place. Kull had purchased a supply of Fielderson’s automobile and carriage paint. He mentioned to a clerk in the store that he was going to use the material on an old surrey he had. He owned no such vehicle. Hence my conclusion, at this time, that the paint was to be used in a further concealment of the identity of the Torpedo.
“Again I heard from Harkville that Kull, after a brief stay at home, following his having been in Griffin, was once more out of town. I was busy with other matters and did not immediately take up the threads of the case again. I was about to do so yesterday,” and here Mr. Rack smiled toward Mr. Wagg, who sat with eyes and mouth open, his glasses perched on the very top of his bald head,—“when Mr. Phil and Mr. David, here, came in upon me, introduced by one of our best young lawyers. They were in possession of so much informationthat, dovetailing their statements with my own previous knowledge, I had a fairly perfect fabric of fact. From this it was simply a little study to deduce practically certain probabilities. However, I spent a few hours piecing out and verifying my threads of information. I found that Kull’s poor mother could probably live but a few days or weeks, at most. I found a man named Coster had been locked up for intoxication here in Griffin, that he was first seen in town on Saturday and his clothing was splashed with mud. Friday was a rainy day, you will remember. By the merest chance my Harkville representative also learned yesterday that Kull had purchased some saws for cutting steel before leaving town on Tuesday. He had bought a ticket for Batavia, but that was no certain sign that he would not stop off in Griffin.
“To see through the man’s entire plan now is, of course, like reading it in print. All that we do not know is just how Coster happened to lose the Torpedo, then pick up the car of ourfriends here, which certainly he did. That we will learn later. The point I would bring to your notice now is that Kull, whatever his first plan may have been, changed somewhat his course of action as he found circumstances favoring him. He had learned of Coster reaching Griffin in an intoxicated condition and being locked up. He enabled him to escape by passing saws in to him by means of a long stick put between the bars of the rear corridor window, which was open. This he did last night, Mr. Fobes believes, and he probably is correct.
“It is an interesting fact, but not a strange one, for usually it is the small thing that trips the criminal up,—an interesting fact, observe, that the dog Kull had been at such pains to be rid of in Harkville, lest it innocently betray the spot where his car had been concealed, had appeared here in Griffin to trouble him. To regain possession of the Torpedo (after having failed to get it placed in a barn where he could more easily get at it) Kull found it necessary to kill the Scotch collie. This he did on Sundaynight. It was also desirable that Mr. Creek be placed beyond power to hinder. An anonymous telephone call from Port Greeley, summoning him there, did the work nicely.
“Now we come to the circumstance that Kull believed so especially favored him—Coster breaking jail, the Torpedo disappearing, poor old Mr. Peek assaulted and killed—all this in one night. Where would suspicion naturally point? To Coster, certainly.”
Mr. Rack smiled and paused.
“Wonderful!” exclaimed Mr. Wagg.
“Not at all. The boys deserve more credit than I. And we found so much additional information the moment we reached Griffin to-night, that the veriest novice could hardly go wrong. Billy had Coster’s measure from boots up. Fobes knew nothing except that he was able to tell me that Creek telephoned to him from Port Greeley, stating that there was deception in his being summoned to that town, and asking him to watch the garage, which, by the way, he did not do. The time was shortand the only particle of credit we deserve is for having moved at once and quickly.
“The time was short for Kull to act if he was to take advantage of favoring circumstances,—that is apparent now and it was before. It required no great mental power to see that at a glance. Where Kull would be found was thus easily determined. And, fortunately, we arrived in time. On my first survey of the Peek place I found nothing but the Torpedo, partially concealed behind some trees by the roadside and every light extinguished. Kull could not be far away but I hesitated lest it should prove that, having not yet entered the house, he should discover that he was watched. The facts were, he was in the house when we reached the place. He was waiting to be sure his victim slept. I flashed a light upon him as he was in the act of striking his first blow and possibly that was why he struck to one side of the temple and only a flesh wound resulted. I seized his arms but he escaped me. I fear Imight have been obliged to shoot to frighten him, if nothing more, but for Phil’s very able and timely help.”
“But what isyouridea as to the reason this fellow Coster left one car in the road and hid another in the icehouse in place of it?” Mr. Wagg inquired.
“One of two things—Coster left the car to look about the Peek place, either knowing or suspecting Kull’s ultimate plan of making away with the old gentleman, and in his absence the machine was in some manner started forward. Or, and I think more probably, Coster was drunk and fell from the Torpedo as he saw another car approaching on that unfrequented road where he did not expect to see, and had no wish to see, any other traveler. And now, perhaps, we would better bid one another goodnight,” Mr. Rack concluded.
“Might as well make it good-morning,” grinned Paul Jones, stepping to a window, “it’s nearly daylight.”
The following day Coster made a complete confession to Mr. Rack. The latter’s idea of the entire plans of Kull were substantially correct. About the abandonment of the Torpedo, Coster said he had been drinking a great deal and, contrary to his usual experience, the more he drank the more he feared for his own safety in the car he knew police and detectives had made prolonged search to find. Seeing a large, six-cylinder machine come rapidly over a hill toward him, and on that lonely road where he had been assured he would see no one whomsoever, he suddenly lost his head. He leaped headlong from the Torpedo into the bushes at the roadside. Later he had crept forward and, from the hillside, watched all that the Auto Boys did until they went away in the empty car. Then he put their machine in the icehouse, guided no doubt by the drunken notion that he was very considerably the gainer. But instead of sobering up and meeting Kull at the American House, as had been agreed he should do, he spent the night in a barn and proceeded to getdrunk again the moment he reached the town in the morning.
“It appears,” said Bob Rack, telling the boys, Chief Fobes (who was still in a perfect fever of wonder and excitement) and Willie Creek the substance of Coster’s confession, the day following Kull’s capture,—“It appears that our Harkville friend concealed his car several days before he pried the padlock off his garage and reported the machine to have been stolen. He had hidden the machine in an unused garage attached to a summer hotel a few miles from the town. Coster obtained it there. Knowing the case as I do now, I would venture to believe that it was the apparent success of his first crime, in defrauding the insurance people, that nerved Kull to carry out his plan further, and so led to the attempt on the life of old Mr. Peek. His plans were clever, after a crude fashion, but he made the mistake every criminal makes sooner or later, in the belief he apparently entertained that deception could be covered up. In the long run thereis no such thing. Even Coster may be truthful when he declares he did not know Kull had defrauded the insurance company.”
CHAPTER XEASTWARD HO!After all this had come to pass, the Auto Boys found that if they so desired there was nothing to hinder carrying out in full all that they had purposed to do when the original plan of their eastern vacation tour had been so amply discussed by the snug fire in Dr. Way’s library.“I propose that we go ahead with the old program,” said P. Jones, Esq., as he occasionally dubbed himself. “We’ve got back our Big Six. She’s all right. Nearly all our luggage and other outfitting stuff is all right. As for gasoline, grub and so on—what’s the odds? We’re not broke yet.”“Guess you’re right, Jonesy,” put in Worth. “For once in your life, you’ve about stated the case correctly.”“If the luck keeps up, all right.” This fromDave, who could not let go all his mental bearings without some pessimistic afterthoughts. “But who’s to say it will hold out? One thing I rather insist on, Phil, since you make a sort of bluff at being our leader. Let’s stick to the guide book route, whether we go through Albany to Boston or whether we short-cut through the Catskills and down the Hudson to New York. That’s my opinion.”They argued it out that last night at Griffin, which they were to leave in the morning for the east.“Somehow I’d like to see New York more’n Boston, I think,” remarked Way. “It would shorten the time of our vacation, and give us more time for side trips, say to Niagara Falls or, if we went down the Hudson, to West Point.”“Geewhillikins! Stop it, Phil!” cried Paul, making a grimace. “I tell you what, boys! After all our troubles we’re going to take in the real country from here on. If I don’t see the Falls, ’twill be because you vote against the Big Six going there.”“And West Point!” This from MacLester, no longer gloomy-viewed. “I’ve wanted to see that place ever so long.”“Tell you what we can do,” chimed in Billy, who had been listening intently. “Let’s have a sort of elastic program, a go-as-you-please route, governed each day by taking a vote as to how we’ll go from then on, subject always to approval of a majority of the voters.”“Will that do?” queried Phil humorously. “There are only four votes. Suppose it’s a tie, what then?”“Aw, Phil!” from the irrepressible Paul. “If it comes to a tie, we’ll keep talking and voting until it’s unanimous or three to one. I guess we’ve all got some horse sense!”Without too much stickling for unanimity, it was finally agreed that while the general plan of the eastern trip should remain the same, whenever advisable there would also be discussions of the next move which would require at least a three-to-one vote in order to decide.“We may all be fools some of the time,”voiced Dave sagely, paraphrasing Lincoln’s noteworthy pronouncement, “but we won’t all of us be fools all the time.” This while shaking his head dubiously at Jones, Esq., who sniffed scornfully.Accordingly, the following morning when the Big Six left Griffin its course was eastward over the big highway prescribed in the guide book.Phil, Dave and Paul took turns at the wheel, and when night was again upon them they were nearing a small town where, according to the guide book, one might turn to the left and before the day was over be fairly within an hour or so of Niagara Falls. They put up at a modest hotel, stored the auto in a convenient garage, took supper and, after a short stroll along an uninteresting main street, retired for the night to a large bedroom with two double beds.Some debate ensued as to whether they should turn off and visit the big falls, during which Worth dropped off asleep while MacLester nearly jerked his head loose as he nodded from the depths of an ancient armchair.“Aw, what’s the use?” grumbled Paul. “Theydon’t carewherewe go!” He pointed at Billy snug in bed, while Dave nodded the sleeper’s approval of whatever course might be taken on the morrow. “They don’t care, I say.”“Well, what do you say, Paul?” Phil regarded the boy quizzically. “Have you ever seen the Falls?”“No, nor I don’t care if Ineversee ’em. Nothing but a roar of water and a cloud of wet spray if you go near ’em below.” Paul’s grammar was humorously absurd at times.“How do you know, if you’ve never been there?”“Haven’t I read and heard about ’em ever since I was knee high to a duck?”“Well then, let’s vote. You wake Billy up.”While Paul was shaking and struggling with Worth, now angry over being thus disturbed, Phil gently tweaked Dave’s nose until he staggered to his feet, making half-blind passes at his disturber as he mumbled:“G’way, you! I—I’ll punch your head, you—you—you—” And that was as far as he ever got.“We’re voting to know if we go to the Falls or keep straight on,” urged Phil loudly. “What is it to be?”Paul just then relinquishing his clutch on Billy’s nightshirt, the latter flopped back on his pillow, jerked the quilt over his head and was buried to the outer world. Phil pinched Dave’s ear until the nodding one hauled back and struck out feebly, hitting nothing and throwing himself back into the big chair’s embracing arms.This being the dumb reply of both, Phil grinned at Paul as he half whispered:“What do you vote, Paul? Is it straight on, leaving the Falls for another time?”“Bet your life—that’s me! Say, Phil, I’ll tell you what I’d really like to do.” As he said this Paul drew from his pocket a crumpled, soiled bit of paper. “Here’s something I got hold of at Griffin.”“Right here’s where we turn off to the right, according to this paper. Got it from Fobes. The Chief said he took it from Coster, who was tearing mad because Fobes got it away from him. Somewhere beyond here—don’t say where—there’s a one-horse tavern—old place, pretty well off the main track. But it’s mighty nigh one of the main railroad lines.”While Paul was talking Phil was examining the paper, growing more interested as he went on. Now he looked up, saying:“It looks like a queer game. It may be worth a gambling chance.”“Think of the boodle! That express car was looted near there some years ago. Another tramp was riding the brake beams and saw the robbers make off in the nearby woods with their boodle. Papers were full of the amount taken.” Paul smacked his lips as if he tasted in anticipation what the money would do. “Then this tramp jumped off and followed them. See? It says so here.” Paul pointed to a paragraph inthe ragged clipping. Phil, having already deciphered this, was reading further. Then he said:“That tramp was blind in one eye. Do you reckon he could tell and mark what those robbers did with their boodle?”“Sure, if he says so. I can see most as well with my hand over one eye as with my two eyes.” Paul in pantomime covered one eye and winked at Phil, who was obliged to laugh. “Well, what does this tramp do? Why, he waits round in hiding until them galoots go off after burying their loot. Then he, like a fool, goes off to sleep. When he woke up his good eye pained him so that he only marked the spot as best he could and struck for the nearest house, which happened to be this old tavern.”“I see,” remarked Phil ruminatively. “From this it appears he got better and stayed, making himself so useful, choring about, that they kept him on. Of course it was the boodle that kept him at work, doubtless meaning to leave when he got better. Once he sneaked overto this big hemlock and tried to dig for the money, but owing to the great rock they had piled over it, and being weak from his sickness, he had to let it go, meaning, of course, to come back when he was strong again. But he didn’t get strong. His other eye became more affected and in time he went blind. After that the tavern folks sent him to the county almshouse, and there he finally died.”“Right-o, Phil!” exclaimed Paul, unable longer to keep silence. “Just before he pegged out, along came this same Coster’s brother, also a tramp. Tramp number one wouldn’t tell the tavern folks because they put him in the almshouse; but he did tell tramp number two, Coster’s brother, just because he was a tramp like himself, I guess. Coster’s brother belonged somewhere around here and loafed his time away, always intending to visit the spot. But he, too, got sick and before he died passed the secret along to Coster. The original thieves never came back because they were later arrested for another crime, that of killing one ofthemselves in a row, and the survivor or survivors were sent up for life or hanged, I reckon. Anyway, they never bothered any one any more.”“But this old printed paper doesn’t tell exactly where the boodle was hid, except that it was close to a big hemlock and under a big rock.” Phil was shaking his head doubtfully. “Where would that hemlock be? There are hemlocks scattered in the woods all around here.”“Here’s something that Coster gave me while he was in jail, towards the last. You see, I’d been sort of kind to him, or he took it that way. I carried him some tobacco. When he found that he was in for a serious time, he handed out to me not only this paper but a scrawl he’d made on the back of an old envelope with a bit of pencil I’d given him some days before. At the time I couldn’t make much of what he was up to. But I guess his bad luck in general was too much for him. After Rack landed him heseemed to give up. Anyway he gave me both these,” meaning the printed bit of crumpled paper and the old envelope which Paul now passed to Phil.“Why didn’t you tell us before, eh?” asked Phil sharply. “Aren’t we all comrades together?”“Yep! But I knew you’d laugh at me for being so simple as to believe anything Coster said. But since we’ve reached this place where we are now, the thing came back to me so strong that I fished out these papers and looked ’em over again. By jimmineddy! I can’t help but think there’s something in all this rigmarole after all.”Phil, after some cogitation, gave back the papers to Paul, saying:“Let’s sleep on it, Paul. You can’t get anything out of them now. In the morning we will go into it again.”In the early morning Billy, who had some advantage over the rest in point of sleep, was upfirst, and was presently whanging the others with his pillow in a way that bade little for further slumbers on their part.“G’way! get out!” cried Paul, feeling less interest just then in treasure hunting than in securing a few more winks before the inevitable bell for breakfast rang forth. “Remember how you acted last night when we wanted you to sit up and talk!”As for Dave, the last to be thus treated by the now wakeful Worth, he grunted, groaned, finally heaving his own pillow at Billy who, dodging the same, renewed his offensive tactics to such effect that MacLester presently sprang forth from beside the now dozing Paul and grumblingly proceeded to dress.“Dave,” began Phil, “I got something to tell you and Billy that I want you to listen to until you get the thing firmly inside your thinkers. Then, if you are interested, we’ll wake up Paul for good and you can look at what he’s got to show you. He showed it to me last night, after we tried to get you two to wake up enough toget the facts fairly through your noddles.”“‘Things’ and ‘noddles’!” This from Billy, tossing his much abused pillow on the bed. “Why don’t you get busy and talk sense? What you got to show us anyhow? As for Paul, he—he’s a—”“He is, is he?” Paul, thus exclaiming, suddenly sat up and discharged his own pillow at Billy, but only managed to hit Phil. “I didn’t mean you, Phil. I’ve been awake for about half a minute, and I know what you’re up to, Phil. Go for ’em, while I dig up the documents.”While Phil was relating the substance of what Paul told him and what the two papers revealed, MacLester sniffed suspiciously and gradually assumed his customary expression when doubtful opinions were being aired, apparently for his own benefit. While Phil was talking, Paul had extracted the crumpled printed scrap, evidently clipped from some long forgotten town weekly, and the mysterious pencillings on the mussed envelope.One after the other Dave and Billy examinedboth the printed clipping and the soiled, misused envelope on which were sundry drawings in pencil. Finally Dave sniffed suspiciously.“S’pose wedoturn off here and do as Paul wants us to? S’pose we spend a day or two enlarging our hotel bill, and don’t find anything after all? Besides, who would believe anything Coster says? Nobody”—here a skeptical look at P. Jones, Esq., now dressing in some haste—“nobody, I say, but him.” Dave jerked a finger at Paul, who was pulling his shirt on over his head.“I hear you,” came Paul’s voice, half smothered as he struggled up through the shirt and, his head popping into view, he eyed MacLester in disdain.“Oh, I don’t know!” remarked Worth, nodding at Phil. “What do you think of it, boss?” meaning Way.“I think just what I said to Paul last night. It’s a gambling chance. Shall we take it? Is it up to a vote?”“You bet!” shouted Paul, greatly enthused.“In the first place it will be lots of fun. No one seems to know anything about this secret place of hiding or what may possibly be hidden there but us. Do they now?”“N-no.” This from Worth, who was evidently much impressed. “We may be fooled, but who shall say that Coster wasn’t acting on the square? I saw Paul going out of his way to make Coster a mite more comfortable, especially after he was caught with the goods on him, so to speak. Bad as he is, he may have had some notion of doing Paul the only good turn he alone could do, by putting him wise to this thing. Anyhow, it’s fun and fun is one thing we’re after.”“Well, then,” remarked Phil, “shall we put it to a vote?”“Yep—let’s vot’er now, right off the bat.” So added Jones, by now fairly in his trousers and reaching for his footgear. “I vote yes—yes, siree!”“So do I,” said Billy, glancing quizzically at Dave. “Me for treasure hunting! Gee!Wouldn’t I like to feel my shovel scrape something hard, and see my hand pull out a wad of bank notes all caked with woods dirt?”“What do you say, Mac?” Phil was looking at MacLester, who colored slightly.“I—I’ll vote last. You say what you’ll do, Phil.”“Oh, well, if you want my decision, I’ll say yes.” Phil here grinned openly at Paul. “I’m fond of our youngest comrade and I want to please him whether we find anything or not.”All looked at Dave, who at first looked foolish, but straightway an open smile wreathed his ruddy Scotch face as he said:“I’m with you, Phil! Paul sometimes acts the fool, but he means well all the same. Here’s for the treasure! If we don’t get it, maybe we’ll have some fun out of it after all.”
CHAPTER X
EASTWARD HO!
After all this had come to pass, the Auto Boys found that if they so desired there was nothing to hinder carrying out in full all that they had purposed to do when the original plan of their eastern vacation tour had been so amply discussed by the snug fire in Dr. Way’s library.
“I propose that we go ahead with the old program,” said P. Jones, Esq., as he occasionally dubbed himself. “We’ve got back our Big Six. She’s all right. Nearly all our luggage and other outfitting stuff is all right. As for gasoline, grub and so on—what’s the odds? We’re not broke yet.”
“Guess you’re right, Jonesy,” put in Worth. “For once in your life, you’ve about stated the case correctly.”
“If the luck keeps up, all right.” This fromDave, who could not let go all his mental bearings without some pessimistic afterthoughts. “But who’s to say it will hold out? One thing I rather insist on, Phil, since you make a sort of bluff at being our leader. Let’s stick to the guide book route, whether we go through Albany to Boston or whether we short-cut through the Catskills and down the Hudson to New York. That’s my opinion.”
They argued it out that last night at Griffin, which they were to leave in the morning for the east.
“Somehow I’d like to see New York more’n Boston, I think,” remarked Way. “It would shorten the time of our vacation, and give us more time for side trips, say to Niagara Falls or, if we went down the Hudson, to West Point.”
“Geewhillikins! Stop it, Phil!” cried Paul, making a grimace. “I tell you what, boys! After all our troubles we’re going to take in the real country from here on. If I don’t see the Falls, ’twill be because you vote against the Big Six going there.”
“And West Point!” This from MacLester, no longer gloomy-viewed. “I’ve wanted to see that place ever so long.”
“Tell you what we can do,” chimed in Billy, who had been listening intently. “Let’s have a sort of elastic program, a go-as-you-please route, governed each day by taking a vote as to how we’ll go from then on, subject always to approval of a majority of the voters.”
“Will that do?” queried Phil humorously. “There are only four votes. Suppose it’s a tie, what then?”
“Aw, Phil!” from the irrepressible Paul. “If it comes to a tie, we’ll keep talking and voting until it’s unanimous or three to one. I guess we’ve all got some horse sense!”
Without too much stickling for unanimity, it was finally agreed that while the general plan of the eastern trip should remain the same, whenever advisable there would also be discussions of the next move which would require at least a three-to-one vote in order to decide.
“We may all be fools some of the time,”voiced Dave sagely, paraphrasing Lincoln’s noteworthy pronouncement, “but we won’t all of us be fools all the time.” This while shaking his head dubiously at Jones, Esq., who sniffed scornfully.
Accordingly, the following morning when the Big Six left Griffin its course was eastward over the big highway prescribed in the guide book.
Phil, Dave and Paul took turns at the wheel, and when night was again upon them they were nearing a small town where, according to the guide book, one might turn to the left and before the day was over be fairly within an hour or so of Niagara Falls. They put up at a modest hotel, stored the auto in a convenient garage, took supper and, after a short stroll along an uninteresting main street, retired for the night to a large bedroom with two double beds.
Some debate ensued as to whether they should turn off and visit the big falls, during which Worth dropped off asleep while MacLester nearly jerked his head loose as he nodded from the depths of an ancient armchair.
“Aw, what’s the use?” grumbled Paul. “Theydon’t carewherewe go!” He pointed at Billy snug in bed, while Dave nodded the sleeper’s approval of whatever course might be taken on the morrow. “They don’t care, I say.”
“Well, what do you say, Paul?” Phil regarded the boy quizzically. “Have you ever seen the Falls?”
“No, nor I don’t care if Ineversee ’em. Nothing but a roar of water and a cloud of wet spray if you go near ’em below.” Paul’s grammar was humorously absurd at times.
“How do you know, if you’ve never been there?”
“Haven’t I read and heard about ’em ever since I was knee high to a duck?”
“Well then, let’s vote. You wake Billy up.”
While Paul was shaking and struggling with Worth, now angry over being thus disturbed, Phil gently tweaked Dave’s nose until he staggered to his feet, making half-blind passes at his disturber as he mumbled:
“G’way, you! I—I’ll punch your head, you—you—you—” And that was as far as he ever got.
“We’re voting to know if we go to the Falls or keep straight on,” urged Phil loudly. “What is it to be?”
Paul just then relinquishing his clutch on Billy’s nightshirt, the latter flopped back on his pillow, jerked the quilt over his head and was buried to the outer world. Phil pinched Dave’s ear until the nodding one hauled back and struck out feebly, hitting nothing and throwing himself back into the big chair’s embracing arms.
This being the dumb reply of both, Phil grinned at Paul as he half whispered:
“What do you vote, Paul? Is it straight on, leaving the Falls for another time?”
“Bet your life—that’s me! Say, Phil, I’ll tell you what I’d really like to do.” As he said this Paul drew from his pocket a crumpled, soiled bit of paper. “Here’s something I got hold of at Griffin.”
“Right here’s where we turn off to the right, according to this paper. Got it from Fobes. The Chief said he took it from Coster, who was tearing mad because Fobes got it away from him. Somewhere beyond here—don’t say where—there’s a one-horse tavern—old place, pretty well off the main track. But it’s mighty nigh one of the main railroad lines.”
While Paul was talking Phil was examining the paper, growing more interested as he went on. Now he looked up, saying:
“It looks like a queer game. It may be worth a gambling chance.”
“Think of the boodle! That express car was looted near there some years ago. Another tramp was riding the brake beams and saw the robbers make off in the nearby woods with their boodle. Papers were full of the amount taken.” Paul smacked his lips as if he tasted in anticipation what the money would do. “Then this tramp jumped off and followed them. See? It says so here.” Paul pointed to a paragraph inthe ragged clipping. Phil, having already deciphered this, was reading further. Then he said:
“That tramp was blind in one eye. Do you reckon he could tell and mark what those robbers did with their boodle?”
“Sure, if he says so. I can see most as well with my hand over one eye as with my two eyes.” Paul in pantomime covered one eye and winked at Phil, who was obliged to laugh. “Well, what does this tramp do? Why, he waits round in hiding until them galoots go off after burying their loot. Then he, like a fool, goes off to sleep. When he woke up his good eye pained him so that he only marked the spot as best he could and struck for the nearest house, which happened to be this old tavern.”
“I see,” remarked Phil ruminatively. “From this it appears he got better and stayed, making himself so useful, choring about, that they kept him on. Of course it was the boodle that kept him at work, doubtless meaning to leave when he got better. Once he sneaked overto this big hemlock and tried to dig for the money, but owing to the great rock they had piled over it, and being weak from his sickness, he had to let it go, meaning, of course, to come back when he was strong again. But he didn’t get strong. His other eye became more affected and in time he went blind. After that the tavern folks sent him to the county almshouse, and there he finally died.”
“Right-o, Phil!” exclaimed Paul, unable longer to keep silence. “Just before he pegged out, along came this same Coster’s brother, also a tramp. Tramp number one wouldn’t tell the tavern folks because they put him in the almshouse; but he did tell tramp number two, Coster’s brother, just because he was a tramp like himself, I guess. Coster’s brother belonged somewhere around here and loafed his time away, always intending to visit the spot. But he, too, got sick and before he died passed the secret along to Coster. The original thieves never came back because they were later arrested for another crime, that of killing one ofthemselves in a row, and the survivor or survivors were sent up for life or hanged, I reckon. Anyway, they never bothered any one any more.”
“But this old printed paper doesn’t tell exactly where the boodle was hid, except that it was close to a big hemlock and under a big rock.” Phil was shaking his head doubtfully. “Where would that hemlock be? There are hemlocks scattered in the woods all around here.”
“Here’s something that Coster gave me while he was in jail, towards the last. You see, I’d been sort of kind to him, or he took it that way. I carried him some tobacco. When he found that he was in for a serious time, he handed out to me not only this paper but a scrawl he’d made on the back of an old envelope with a bit of pencil I’d given him some days before. At the time I couldn’t make much of what he was up to. But I guess his bad luck in general was too much for him. After Rack landed him heseemed to give up. Anyway he gave me both these,” meaning the printed bit of crumpled paper and the old envelope which Paul now passed to Phil.
“Why didn’t you tell us before, eh?” asked Phil sharply. “Aren’t we all comrades together?”
“Yep! But I knew you’d laugh at me for being so simple as to believe anything Coster said. But since we’ve reached this place where we are now, the thing came back to me so strong that I fished out these papers and looked ’em over again. By jimmineddy! I can’t help but think there’s something in all this rigmarole after all.”
Phil, after some cogitation, gave back the papers to Paul, saying:
“Let’s sleep on it, Paul. You can’t get anything out of them now. In the morning we will go into it again.”
In the early morning Billy, who had some advantage over the rest in point of sleep, was upfirst, and was presently whanging the others with his pillow in a way that bade little for further slumbers on their part.
“G’way! get out!” cried Paul, feeling less interest just then in treasure hunting than in securing a few more winks before the inevitable bell for breakfast rang forth. “Remember how you acted last night when we wanted you to sit up and talk!”
As for Dave, the last to be thus treated by the now wakeful Worth, he grunted, groaned, finally heaving his own pillow at Billy who, dodging the same, renewed his offensive tactics to such effect that MacLester presently sprang forth from beside the now dozing Paul and grumblingly proceeded to dress.
“Dave,” began Phil, “I got something to tell you and Billy that I want you to listen to until you get the thing firmly inside your thinkers. Then, if you are interested, we’ll wake up Paul for good and you can look at what he’s got to show you. He showed it to me last night, after we tried to get you two to wake up enough toget the facts fairly through your noddles.”
“‘Things’ and ‘noddles’!” This from Billy, tossing his much abused pillow on the bed. “Why don’t you get busy and talk sense? What you got to show us anyhow? As for Paul, he—he’s a—”
“He is, is he?” Paul, thus exclaiming, suddenly sat up and discharged his own pillow at Billy, but only managed to hit Phil. “I didn’t mean you, Phil. I’ve been awake for about half a minute, and I know what you’re up to, Phil. Go for ’em, while I dig up the documents.”
While Phil was relating the substance of what Paul told him and what the two papers revealed, MacLester sniffed suspiciously and gradually assumed his customary expression when doubtful opinions were being aired, apparently for his own benefit. While Phil was talking, Paul had extracted the crumpled printed scrap, evidently clipped from some long forgotten town weekly, and the mysterious pencillings on the mussed envelope.
One after the other Dave and Billy examinedboth the printed clipping and the soiled, misused envelope on which were sundry drawings in pencil. Finally Dave sniffed suspiciously.
“S’pose wedoturn off here and do as Paul wants us to? S’pose we spend a day or two enlarging our hotel bill, and don’t find anything after all? Besides, who would believe anything Coster says? Nobody”—here a skeptical look at P. Jones, Esq., now dressing in some haste—“nobody, I say, but him.” Dave jerked a finger at Paul, who was pulling his shirt on over his head.
“I hear you,” came Paul’s voice, half smothered as he struggled up through the shirt and, his head popping into view, he eyed MacLester in disdain.
“Oh, I don’t know!” remarked Worth, nodding at Phil. “What do you think of it, boss?” meaning Way.
“I think just what I said to Paul last night. It’s a gambling chance. Shall we take it? Is it up to a vote?”
“You bet!” shouted Paul, greatly enthused.“In the first place it will be lots of fun. No one seems to know anything about this secret place of hiding or what may possibly be hidden there but us. Do they now?”
“N-no.” This from Worth, who was evidently much impressed. “We may be fooled, but who shall say that Coster wasn’t acting on the square? I saw Paul going out of his way to make Coster a mite more comfortable, especially after he was caught with the goods on him, so to speak. Bad as he is, he may have had some notion of doing Paul the only good turn he alone could do, by putting him wise to this thing. Anyhow, it’s fun and fun is one thing we’re after.”
“Well, then,” remarked Phil, “shall we put it to a vote?”
“Yep—let’s vot’er now, right off the bat.” So added Jones, by now fairly in his trousers and reaching for his footgear. “I vote yes—yes, siree!”
“So do I,” said Billy, glancing quizzically at Dave. “Me for treasure hunting! Gee!Wouldn’t I like to feel my shovel scrape something hard, and see my hand pull out a wad of bank notes all caked with woods dirt?”
“What do you say, Mac?” Phil was looking at MacLester, who colored slightly.
“I—I’ll vote last. You say what you’ll do, Phil.”
“Oh, well, if you want my decision, I’ll say yes.” Phil here grinned openly at Paul. “I’m fond of our youngest comrade and I want to please him whether we find anything or not.”
All looked at Dave, who at first looked foolish, but straightway an open smile wreathed his ruddy Scotch face as he said:
“I’m with you, Phil! Paul sometimes acts the fool, but he means well all the same. Here’s for the treasure! If we don’t get it, maybe we’ll have some fun out of it after all.”
CHAPTER XIPASSING THE LOAD OF HAYLater that morning the Big Six was spinning over the road eastward from the small village where the preceding debate had occurred. Before starting Phil had asked their host if he knew of an old inn some miles ahead that had formerly been prosperous during the old stage-coaching days, before the advent of the railroads. The tavern keeper scratched his head as he reflected. Finally he said:“Can’t think of nary place onless it’s what they used to call the Ghost Tavern, but—law me! That place must ’a’ rotted down before now.”Phil intimated that this might be what he was after, asking how far the inn with the foreboding name might be.“Might be thirty mile or it might be fifty ormore, I can’t say. You might pass it not knowing where it is, and yet be within a few rods of where it is—or was. It’s a woodsy neighborhood, and seems to me that I heard it had burned down but I won’t be sure. Anyhow, that’s the only place I’ve learned of beyond here, eastward, that in the least is like what you been asking about. What might you kids be wanting such a place for? Looks like I’d ruther pass it not knowing there was such a thing near as a ghost tavern.”Phil replied evasively, for it was decided to say nothing at present as to what the boys were up to. At least to say nothing that might make others think that anything out of the common was embodied in their present purposes.Before the car started, however, the innkeeper, still scratching his grizzled head, looked up again, saying:“Seems like I heard ’way back yonder that there was a tavern near where a big railroad robbery took place. But I ain’t sure. Old folks like me find that we forgit easier than weremember. However, I wish ye all good luck. Keep your eyes open, boys, and don’t go it blind—at least no blinder ’n you can help. So long!”All this strengthened their confidence in the sincerity of Coster’s last bequest to P. Jones, Esq., who plumed himself accordingly, after his customary manner. He pinched Dave’s arm as he said:“Bet your life, Dave, there was more in what Coster gave me than you thought! You’re driving. You watch the road. Me and Phil and Billy will keep up a lookout that will not miss that old tavern, ghost or no ghost.”“S’pose the old rookery has been burned or made way with?” Dave propounded this while curving his course round a steep embankment that made the roadway barely wide enough for two vehicles to pass. Before Paul had time to retort a rumble ahead broke in on their ears. Dave instantly turned towards the bluff on his right, for the shelving embankment sloped steeply to the left.“That’s right, Mac!” interposed Paul, his attention being thus diverted from a witticism at MacLester’s expense. “Jam her close to the bluff and let the other fellow do the worrying.”Just then, round the further end of the curve came a farm wagon loaded with hay, one man driving as he sat cramped against the dashboard, while on the load behind was a boy and a girl, both somewhere along their teens in age. When the farm team saw the purring car they balked, tried to shy dangerously towards the slope, but the man behind reined them up so sharply that they were halted midway of the road and about twenty feet from the car. Dave at once shut off the power and the purring ceased.“Say, mister!” called the man anxiously. “How we goin’ to pass ye?”“We’ve tried to give you all the room we could, don’t you see?” This from MacLester as he leaned coolly back in his seat. “You’ll have to slow up, then go at a walk to the right, won’t you?”“My team’s sorter skeery along here. They ain’t used to you autermobile fellers. Whoa thar! What ye up to now?”The team was trying to shy again as they eyed the strange monster just ahead that was as terrifying to them as when some unsuspecting hunter suddenly sees just ahead of him a dangerous beast of prey. Meantime Phil, noting the alarm of the girl on the hay and similar symptoms in the younger boy, was taking in the possibilities of the situation. He signalled to the others to keep silent, then sprang out of the tonneau and made cautiously towards the team, speaking soothingly the while as the man held them in tightly.“Let me get hold of their headstalls,” he called, raising his voice slightly. “I think we can manage it. We’ll pass each other all right.”By cautious management, speaking calmly to the horses, Phil managed at last to seize first one bridle, then the other, rubbing his hand propitiatingly over their noses, while securing agood grip on the startled animals, and began leading them to the left, towards the bluff. At the same time he called to Dave, in a low but distinct tone:“Loose the brake! Get out, two of you, and back the car gently. Keep her headed towards the middle of the road. Don’t release your clutch, Dave.”With some difficulty Phil’s directions were implicitly followed by the boys, all of whom had learned in the past to defer to Phil’s judgment when sudden decisions were required. When the Big Six was squarely midway of the road and pointed slightly outward towards the dangerous slope, the car was halted, and Paul and Billy clambered back into the machine.“Now, my friend,” said Phil, “if I lead them, can you turn in close to the bluff, right where we were when we first saw you?”“I’ll try mighty hard. Whoa, Jack! Easy now, Jill!”With Way still at their heads, the wagon andits cumbrous load were safely jammed against the side of the bluff.“Perhaps the young lady and the boy better get off on the upper side. We’ll try to pass you, but your team may not like the situation.” Phil smiled. “It may cause trouble, but we will be as careful as we can.”“Well, boss,” said the man, “you sure are good boys. My team—well, I don’t know what they might have done if I’d tried to pass you on the outside.”He turned back to the couple on the hay. “Say, Danny, you slide off and then help Nan down. Be keerful! Remember she’s your sister, and if she gets a fall you’ll have to settle with me later.”Danny, a straw-hatted, barefooted lad with a freckled face and dangling legs, managed to slide himself down against the bluff and also managed to assist the girl in following him to a spot where they could uneasily await further developments.“Better not start your car until I git by,” remarked the farmer, while Phil, still holding the bridles, aided the loaded wagon to slip by the red monster, now quiet enough on the dangerous side of the road. Once their backs were towards the machine the team quieted down quickly enough.“Let me help you down, miss,” said Phil, who never forgot his manners, springing back towards the young couple climbing down to the roadway.Danny, like many brothers, having scrambled down unaided, went to his father’s aid, though aid was now unnecessary. Phil soon helped Nan down, the weight of her plump young body convincing him that she must be several years older than Dan.“I’m mightily obliged, sir,” she lisped, with an upward glance at the boy as he landed her squarely on her feet, not bare like her brother’s but clad in fairly dainty footwear. “I don’t know what we’d ’a’ done but for you.”“Pshaw, that’s nothing! I’m sure glad wewere on hand, Miss—” He hesitated. “Is there anything more we can do?”Nothing, apparently; but before starting the car again, Paul called out:“Say, Mister! How far is it to the nearest town on this road?”“Ten mile, I reckon. We live three miles beyond.”As the car started Phil waved a hand from the auto, whereat a white handkerchief fluttered back an answering signal.Dave turned back to Way, saying:“Blame if I don’t believe you’ve made a regular mash on that girl—hey, Paul?” Paul, now at the wheel, was too busy to reply.“Wonder what they were doing so far from home with a load of hay?” said Dave.“It’s past haying time now,” was Worth’s comment. “Must be taking it off somewhere to sell. If so, that explains why the girl was dressed so nicely.”“How about the man and boy?” asked Paul. “They looked like real hayseeds.”“How’d you want ’em to look?” This from Dave. “When you’re selling hay you can’t load or unload in your Sunday go-to-meeting clothes.”“Well,” remarked Phil, “whoever and whatever they are, we tried to be decent to them. I reckon they’re all right.”“Especially the girl, eh?” laughed Paul. “Oh, you Nan! Wasn’t that her name, Phil? You ought to know.”Phil passed this by without reply, as he talked about other matters. Little did any of them then think that they had not seen the last of those three whom they had saved from possible accident and bodily danger by giving them the safest side of the road.From then on for half an hour the car glided smoothly through a rich farming section where the houses and barns looked prosperous and the numerous stacks of grain and hay and the sleek herds of cattle betokened that the owners or tenants were by no means on the wrong side of prosperity. Then the timbered tracts increased,and a series of low, rugged hillsides opened up until at a sudden bend they saw the town whose smoke had been for some time indicative of this break in the hitherto uninterrupted rural expanse of their morning’s ride.It was not a big town, being off the railroad lines, which were a mile or so to one side, but it looked prosperous and was doubtless the center of the rural trade activities for some miles around. It being now about the noon hour, the car stopped before a modest hotel for a noonday lunch. There were two larger hostelries on the main street, but from motives of prudent economy the boys preferred the less expensive taverns.“Yes, we will have dinner ready in a few minutes,” remarked a comfortable looking woman who seemed to be in charge of the tiny office. “Make yourselves at home. Why, are you lads from Lannington?” This after reading the register.“That is our home town, madam,” replied Phil. “Do you know the place?”“Well, I should say I did!” The woman smiled. “I was raised there. Been off here ever since I married.”“Lannington is where we live,” remarked Worth, after inscribing his name on the register with a flourish. “We’re on a vacation trip, ma’am.”“It might be that you knew our folks when you lived there,” was Dave’s contributing remark, for he saw that she was reading their names and smiling more broadly than before.“Why, yes, I do know some of them. I knew Dr. Way, and there was his friend Lawyer Dilworth, and the MacLesters. I feel as if I knew you all right now.”And she offered her plump hand, which was cordially shaken as the boys explained more about their folks, then added:“My name now is Ewing. I’m known as the Widow Ewing round here. My husband has been dead three years or so. Before that, in Lannington, I was a McKnight. One of my brothers runs a garage there. Know him?”“Well, rather! Hey, Phil? We got this car mainly through his aid. McKnight & Wilder—they’re some punkins when it comes to automobiles!”After this all was plain sailing for the boys. Mrs. Ewing insisted that they should remain until the morrow.“Won’t cost you much. We’ll cut the regular bill in half, for you’re home folks, aren’t you?”And it may be said that she had her way. The Big Six was put in the hotel garage and the boys were made comfortable in two adjoining rooms; and in the morning even Phil was astonished at the exceedingly small bill which they had to pay. He could only thank the comely widow, who laughed it off with:“If you boys are simply on a vacation trip, you’re bound to spend more than you think you will. I’d gladly keep you for nothing, but times are hard and I have to make some charge.”Cautious inquiries by Phil resulted in learning that there had been, and still might be furtheron an old inn of the pre-railroad days. But it was off the main road, in the roughest, heaviest wooded section, somewhere about eight or ten miles off to the east. That region, it appeared, was poor, swampy, and so inferior to other land lying all about that hardly anyone lived there, even though in the midst of a thickly settled country.In the privacy of their rooms the four lads concluded that they would say nothing directly referring to the railroad robbery or the hiding of supposed treasure. They were so near the scene that any revival of that now old-time tragedy might cause annoying inquisitiveness even if nothing more resulted.After breakfast, while the boys were making a few purchases and taking on a generous supply of gasoline, they learned from Mrs. Ewing that “Dan and Nan, with their Daddy, old Pat Feeney,” had just gone by.“And who are they?” queried Phil carelessly, though with a shrewd suspicion in his mind at the time.“Oh, he’s an Irishman and lives three or four miles from here on the edge of some marshland where he pretends to farm. But I guess the most of his farming consists in cutting the marsh-grass during the summer and selling it for hay to those who don’t know what good hay really is.”“I guess we must have met him some ten or twelve miles back. We had quite a time passing him, for it was where the road runs along a side hill, with the bluff on one side and a steep embankment on the other. We stopped our car for his team was scared and after some delay they passed. They seemed to appreciate what we did, instead of rushing by and probably scaring the whole outfit into the ditch. The girl was rather pretty.”“Ah, you boys!” The widow smiled shrewdly. “Always an eye out for the girls! But don’t you allow yourselves to think that what a girl looks, so she always is underneath the surface.”“Are you coming back this way?” the widowfinally asked, as the car was about to start. “If you don’t stop, I—I will feel hurt. I’m homesick at times for the town where I was raised.”“Tell you what,” said Billy after the car had left the small but busy town a mile or two in their rear, “Mrs. Ewing treated us bang up, but she’s a keen one, after all. I’m glad we saw her. It will be something to tell McKnight when we get home. Do you reckon those Feeneys are the ones we passed?”“What if they are or if they ain’t?” demanded Paul. “We won’t be likely to meet ’em again, will we?”“Oh, you shut up, Jonesy. There’s no one interested in ’em but Phil, and the best way to define that is by a lesson in spelling.” Here Billy made a comical face as he began: “N-a-n, Nan. That, translated into plain lingo, means pretty girl—ouch! Quit, Phil!” For Phil, seated in the tonneau with Worth, had administered a decided pinch.On sped the Big Six, easily showing what shecould do along an increasingly rough road that might once have been a much traveled highway but now showed ample signs of the neglect of later years. The wooded tracts increased, growing larger in area; the half cultivated fields evinced even more of the neglect and shagginess that wait on lands wholly or in part abandoned by man. Sundry denizens of the woods such as rabbits, squirrels, even a stray fox, together with many birds, and upflying broods of quail, also indicated that nature was gradually replacing human inactivity in her own way.“By the way,” remarked Worth, “didn’t that man with the hay say he lived some three miles from that town we stopped in—what’s the confounded name?”“Midlandville, stupid!” This from P. Jones, Esq., with a superior air. “That was one of the first things I heard.”“Coster’s paper didn’t mention that burg, did it?” asked Dave.“Reckon not. But on this envelope,” here Phil took out the pencilled scrap, “there’s adot with the word ‘town’ beside it that I take to mean the same thing. Here runs the railroad, going east and west. Look at this line running due southeast. Somewhere along that line I figure there ought to be signs of the old tavern. I guess we’ve left that town at least six or eight miles behind.”Where they were now much of the timber appeared to be second growth, and such hemlocks as they saw were small.In a shaded spot to the right of the ill-kept highway they stopped at a small rivulet for the noonday lunch. This was eaten rather silently. In fact, so gloomy were their surroundings that after eating Phil Way proposed that they should divide themselves, two in each party, and explore to the north and south of the highway for a mile or so, making a detour into the forest as they went.“I’m with you,” said Paul briskly. “I’m getting tired of all this guessing. Let’s start from here, Phil, and take a half circle northwest, then west, then south, crossing the highway.After another mile, we’ll turn east, then northeast, then north until we strike the road again. Dave, you and Billy do the same thing, only turn northeast, east, then south and so on so as to bring you back to the road not far from where we all are now.”But before any comment could be made on this plan there came a sudden interruption.
CHAPTER XI
PASSING THE LOAD OF HAY
Later that morning the Big Six was spinning over the road eastward from the small village where the preceding debate had occurred. Before starting Phil had asked their host if he knew of an old inn some miles ahead that had formerly been prosperous during the old stage-coaching days, before the advent of the railroads. The tavern keeper scratched his head as he reflected. Finally he said:
“Can’t think of nary place onless it’s what they used to call the Ghost Tavern, but—law me! That place must ’a’ rotted down before now.”
Phil intimated that this might be what he was after, asking how far the inn with the foreboding name might be.
“Might be thirty mile or it might be fifty ormore, I can’t say. You might pass it not knowing where it is, and yet be within a few rods of where it is—or was. It’s a woodsy neighborhood, and seems to me that I heard it had burned down but I won’t be sure. Anyhow, that’s the only place I’ve learned of beyond here, eastward, that in the least is like what you been asking about. What might you kids be wanting such a place for? Looks like I’d ruther pass it not knowing there was such a thing near as a ghost tavern.”
Phil replied evasively, for it was decided to say nothing at present as to what the boys were up to. At least to say nothing that might make others think that anything out of the common was embodied in their present purposes.
Before the car started, however, the innkeeper, still scratching his grizzled head, looked up again, saying:
“Seems like I heard ’way back yonder that there was a tavern near where a big railroad robbery took place. But I ain’t sure. Old folks like me find that we forgit easier than weremember. However, I wish ye all good luck. Keep your eyes open, boys, and don’t go it blind—at least no blinder ’n you can help. So long!”
All this strengthened their confidence in the sincerity of Coster’s last bequest to P. Jones, Esq., who plumed himself accordingly, after his customary manner. He pinched Dave’s arm as he said:
“Bet your life, Dave, there was more in what Coster gave me than you thought! You’re driving. You watch the road. Me and Phil and Billy will keep up a lookout that will not miss that old tavern, ghost or no ghost.”
“S’pose the old rookery has been burned or made way with?” Dave propounded this while curving his course round a steep embankment that made the roadway barely wide enough for two vehicles to pass. Before Paul had time to retort a rumble ahead broke in on their ears. Dave instantly turned towards the bluff on his right, for the shelving embankment sloped steeply to the left.
“That’s right, Mac!” interposed Paul, his attention being thus diverted from a witticism at MacLester’s expense. “Jam her close to the bluff and let the other fellow do the worrying.”
Just then, round the further end of the curve came a farm wagon loaded with hay, one man driving as he sat cramped against the dashboard, while on the load behind was a boy and a girl, both somewhere along their teens in age. When the farm team saw the purring car they balked, tried to shy dangerously towards the slope, but the man behind reined them up so sharply that they were halted midway of the road and about twenty feet from the car. Dave at once shut off the power and the purring ceased.
“Say, mister!” called the man anxiously. “How we goin’ to pass ye?”
“We’ve tried to give you all the room we could, don’t you see?” This from MacLester as he leaned coolly back in his seat. “You’ll have to slow up, then go at a walk to the right, won’t you?”
“My team’s sorter skeery along here. They ain’t used to you autermobile fellers. Whoa thar! What ye up to now?”
The team was trying to shy again as they eyed the strange monster just ahead that was as terrifying to them as when some unsuspecting hunter suddenly sees just ahead of him a dangerous beast of prey. Meantime Phil, noting the alarm of the girl on the hay and similar symptoms in the younger boy, was taking in the possibilities of the situation. He signalled to the others to keep silent, then sprang out of the tonneau and made cautiously towards the team, speaking soothingly the while as the man held them in tightly.
“Let me get hold of their headstalls,” he called, raising his voice slightly. “I think we can manage it. We’ll pass each other all right.”
By cautious management, speaking calmly to the horses, Phil managed at last to seize first one bridle, then the other, rubbing his hand propitiatingly over their noses, while securing agood grip on the startled animals, and began leading them to the left, towards the bluff. At the same time he called to Dave, in a low but distinct tone:
“Loose the brake! Get out, two of you, and back the car gently. Keep her headed towards the middle of the road. Don’t release your clutch, Dave.”
With some difficulty Phil’s directions were implicitly followed by the boys, all of whom had learned in the past to defer to Phil’s judgment when sudden decisions were required. When the Big Six was squarely midway of the road and pointed slightly outward towards the dangerous slope, the car was halted, and Paul and Billy clambered back into the machine.
“Now, my friend,” said Phil, “if I lead them, can you turn in close to the bluff, right where we were when we first saw you?”
“I’ll try mighty hard. Whoa, Jack! Easy now, Jill!”
With Way still at their heads, the wagon andits cumbrous load were safely jammed against the side of the bluff.
“Perhaps the young lady and the boy better get off on the upper side. We’ll try to pass you, but your team may not like the situation.” Phil smiled. “It may cause trouble, but we will be as careful as we can.”
“Well, boss,” said the man, “you sure are good boys. My team—well, I don’t know what they might have done if I’d tried to pass you on the outside.”
He turned back to the couple on the hay. “Say, Danny, you slide off and then help Nan down. Be keerful! Remember she’s your sister, and if she gets a fall you’ll have to settle with me later.”
Danny, a straw-hatted, barefooted lad with a freckled face and dangling legs, managed to slide himself down against the bluff and also managed to assist the girl in following him to a spot where they could uneasily await further developments.
“Better not start your car until I git by,” remarked the farmer, while Phil, still holding the bridles, aided the loaded wagon to slip by the red monster, now quiet enough on the dangerous side of the road. Once their backs were towards the machine the team quieted down quickly enough.
“Let me help you down, miss,” said Phil, who never forgot his manners, springing back towards the young couple climbing down to the roadway.
Danny, like many brothers, having scrambled down unaided, went to his father’s aid, though aid was now unnecessary. Phil soon helped Nan down, the weight of her plump young body convincing him that she must be several years older than Dan.
“I’m mightily obliged, sir,” she lisped, with an upward glance at the boy as he landed her squarely on her feet, not bare like her brother’s but clad in fairly dainty footwear. “I don’t know what we’d ’a’ done but for you.”
“Pshaw, that’s nothing! I’m sure glad wewere on hand, Miss—” He hesitated. “Is there anything more we can do?”
Nothing, apparently; but before starting the car again, Paul called out:
“Say, Mister! How far is it to the nearest town on this road?”
“Ten mile, I reckon. We live three miles beyond.”
As the car started Phil waved a hand from the auto, whereat a white handkerchief fluttered back an answering signal.
Dave turned back to Way, saying:
“Blame if I don’t believe you’ve made a regular mash on that girl—hey, Paul?” Paul, now at the wheel, was too busy to reply.
“Wonder what they were doing so far from home with a load of hay?” said Dave.
“It’s past haying time now,” was Worth’s comment. “Must be taking it off somewhere to sell. If so, that explains why the girl was dressed so nicely.”
“How about the man and boy?” asked Paul. “They looked like real hayseeds.”
“How’d you want ’em to look?” This from Dave. “When you’re selling hay you can’t load or unload in your Sunday go-to-meeting clothes.”
“Well,” remarked Phil, “whoever and whatever they are, we tried to be decent to them. I reckon they’re all right.”
“Especially the girl, eh?” laughed Paul. “Oh, you Nan! Wasn’t that her name, Phil? You ought to know.”
Phil passed this by without reply, as he talked about other matters. Little did any of them then think that they had not seen the last of those three whom they had saved from possible accident and bodily danger by giving them the safest side of the road.
From then on for half an hour the car glided smoothly through a rich farming section where the houses and barns looked prosperous and the numerous stacks of grain and hay and the sleek herds of cattle betokened that the owners or tenants were by no means on the wrong side of prosperity. Then the timbered tracts increased,and a series of low, rugged hillsides opened up until at a sudden bend they saw the town whose smoke had been for some time indicative of this break in the hitherto uninterrupted rural expanse of their morning’s ride.
It was not a big town, being off the railroad lines, which were a mile or so to one side, but it looked prosperous and was doubtless the center of the rural trade activities for some miles around. It being now about the noon hour, the car stopped before a modest hotel for a noonday lunch. There were two larger hostelries on the main street, but from motives of prudent economy the boys preferred the less expensive taverns.
“Yes, we will have dinner ready in a few minutes,” remarked a comfortable looking woman who seemed to be in charge of the tiny office. “Make yourselves at home. Why, are you lads from Lannington?” This after reading the register.
“That is our home town, madam,” replied Phil. “Do you know the place?”
“Well, I should say I did!” The woman smiled. “I was raised there. Been off here ever since I married.”
“Lannington is where we live,” remarked Worth, after inscribing his name on the register with a flourish. “We’re on a vacation trip, ma’am.”
“It might be that you knew our folks when you lived there,” was Dave’s contributing remark, for he saw that she was reading their names and smiling more broadly than before.
“Why, yes, I do know some of them. I knew Dr. Way, and there was his friend Lawyer Dilworth, and the MacLesters. I feel as if I knew you all right now.”
And she offered her plump hand, which was cordially shaken as the boys explained more about their folks, then added:
“My name now is Ewing. I’m known as the Widow Ewing round here. My husband has been dead three years or so. Before that, in Lannington, I was a McKnight. One of my brothers runs a garage there. Know him?”
“Well, rather! Hey, Phil? We got this car mainly through his aid. McKnight & Wilder—they’re some punkins when it comes to automobiles!”
After this all was plain sailing for the boys. Mrs. Ewing insisted that they should remain until the morrow.
“Won’t cost you much. We’ll cut the regular bill in half, for you’re home folks, aren’t you?”
And it may be said that she had her way. The Big Six was put in the hotel garage and the boys were made comfortable in two adjoining rooms; and in the morning even Phil was astonished at the exceedingly small bill which they had to pay. He could only thank the comely widow, who laughed it off with:
“If you boys are simply on a vacation trip, you’re bound to spend more than you think you will. I’d gladly keep you for nothing, but times are hard and I have to make some charge.”
Cautious inquiries by Phil resulted in learning that there had been, and still might be furtheron an old inn of the pre-railroad days. But it was off the main road, in the roughest, heaviest wooded section, somewhere about eight or ten miles off to the east. That region, it appeared, was poor, swampy, and so inferior to other land lying all about that hardly anyone lived there, even though in the midst of a thickly settled country.
In the privacy of their rooms the four lads concluded that they would say nothing directly referring to the railroad robbery or the hiding of supposed treasure. They were so near the scene that any revival of that now old-time tragedy might cause annoying inquisitiveness even if nothing more resulted.
After breakfast, while the boys were making a few purchases and taking on a generous supply of gasoline, they learned from Mrs. Ewing that “Dan and Nan, with their Daddy, old Pat Feeney,” had just gone by.
“And who are they?” queried Phil carelessly, though with a shrewd suspicion in his mind at the time.
“Oh, he’s an Irishman and lives three or four miles from here on the edge of some marshland where he pretends to farm. But I guess the most of his farming consists in cutting the marsh-grass during the summer and selling it for hay to those who don’t know what good hay really is.”
“I guess we must have met him some ten or twelve miles back. We had quite a time passing him, for it was where the road runs along a side hill, with the bluff on one side and a steep embankment on the other. We stopped our car for his team was scared and after some delay they passed. They seemed to appreciate what we did, instead of rushing by and probably scaring the whole outfit into the ditch. The girl was rather pretty.”
“Ah, you boys!” The widow smiled shrewdly. “Always an eye out for the girls! But don’t you allow yourselves to think that what a girl looks, so she always is underneath the surface.”
“Are you coming back this way?” the widowfinally asked, as the car was about to start. “If you don’t stop, I—I will feel hurt. I’m homesick at times for the town where I was raised.”
“Tell you what,” said Billy after the car had left the small but busy town a mile or two in their rear, “Mrs. Ewing treated us bang up, but she’s a keen one, after all. I’m glad we saw her. It will be something to tell McKnight when we get home. Do you reckon those Feeneys are the ones we passed?”
“What if they are or if they ain’t?” demanded Paul. “We won’t be likely to meet ’em again, will we?”
“Oh, you shut up, Jonesy. There’s no one interested in ’em but Phil, and the best way to define that is by a lesson in spelling.” Here Billy made a comical face as he began: “N-a-n, Nan. That, translated into plain lingo, means pretty girl—ouch! Quit, Phil!” For Phil, seated in the tonneau with Worth, had administered a decided pinch.
On sped the Big Six, easily showing what shecould do along an increasingly rough road that might once have been a much traveled highway but now showed ample signs of the neglect of later years. The wooded tracts increased, growing larger in area; the half cultivated fields evinced even more of the neglect and shagginess that wait on lands wholly or in part abandoned by man. Sundry denizens of the woods such as rabbits, squirrels, even a stray fox, together with many birds, and upflying broods of quail, also indicated that nature was gradually replacing human inactivity in her own way.
“By the way,” remarked Worth, “didn’t that man with the hay say he lived some three miles from that town we stopped in—what’s the confounded name?”
“Midlandville, stupid!” This from P. Jones, Esq., with a superior air. “That was one of the first things I heard.”
“Coster’s paper didn’t mention that burg, did it?” asked Dave.
“Reckon not. But on this envelope,” here Phil took out the pencilled scrap, “there’s adot with the word ‘town’ beside it that I take to mean the same thing. Here runs the railroad, going east and west. Look at this line running due southeast. Somewhere along that line I figure there ought to be signs of the old tavern. I guess we’ve left that town at least six or eight miles behind.”
Where they were now much of the timber appeared to be second growth, and such hemlocks as they saw were small.
In a shaded spot to the right of the ill-kept highway they stopped at a small rivulet for the noonday lunch. This was eaten rather silently. In fact, so gloomy were their surroundings that after eating Phil Way proposed that they should divide themselves, two in each party, and explore to the north and south of the highway for a mile or so, making a detour into the forest as they went.
“I’m with you,” said Paul briskly. “I’m getting tired of all this guessing. Let’s start from here, Phil, and take a half circle northwest, then west, then south, crossing the highway.After another mile, we’ll turn east, then northeast, then north until we strike the road again. Dave, you and Billy do the same thing, only turn northeast, east, then south and so on so as to bring you back to the road not far from where we all are now.”
But before any comment could be made on this plan there came a sudden interruption.