"All ready!"
It was Cora who spoke. She and her chums, the Robinson twins, and a fourth girl, were about to start out for the afternoon run Jack had mentioned. The fourth girl was Mary Downs, a little millinery model and helper, to whom Cora had promised a ride in the new car. It was Mary's initial spin, and, as Cora cranked up, the young girl, with the queer, deep-set eyes, and the long, oval face so dear to the hearts of model-hunters, fairly quivered with anticipation.
"Are you all right, Mary?" asked Cora with a reassuring smile.
"Oh, yes," replied the girl with a happy little laugh. "This is—just glorious!"
"Wait just a minute," begged Bess. "I want to tie my hat on more securely. I do hope we get our auto bonnets soon."
"Madam said they would be finished to-day," remarked Mary. "They are very pretty, I think." Madam Julia was Mary's employer.
"Chug! chug!" sounded from the motor as it speeded up, momentarily, drowning all conversation. Then, as Cora climbed in and adjusted the throttle and shifted the spark lever, she let in the clutch, and the car rolled gently away.
"Where were the boys to meet us?" asked Belle.
"At the turnpike junction," replied Cora as she deftly threw in the high speed gear, and that without the terrific grinding of the cogs that betrays the inexperienced hand. The Whirlwind leaped forward, and the girls clutched their hats. "Jack promised he wouldn't be a minute late," went on Cora as she turned out to avoid a rut.
"Jack usually is on time," murmured Isabel. She almost lisped, yet the more you heard it the more you thought it was but a pretty little catch in her voice—in the accent—after the manner of babies, who seem to defer all they have to say to their listener. Every one loved Isabel.
"Oh, you think so, do you?" asked her sister. "Jack never makes any mistakes apparent to Belle," she added with an arch glance at Cora, with whom she was riding on the front seat.
"Never mind," murmured Belle.
Mary listened to the talk with evident pleasure. She was not accustomed to this sort of perfectly frank jokes.
"There they are!" suddenly cried Cora as the Get There swerved into sight around the corner.
Jack, who was at the wheel of his car, with Walter beside him, swung in close to his sister's machine.
"All right?" asked Jack, looking critically at Cora as she slowed up the big car, and noting her firm grip of the steering wheel.
"Fine and dandy!" exclaimed the girl, with the expression that makes that sort of slang a parody rather than a convenience.
"And if there aren't Sid and Ida!" exclaimed Belle. "Seems to me we run into them wherever we go."
"As long as it's only metaphorically and not mechanically speaking, it's all right," observed Walter.
The yellow Streak glided smoothly along.
"Quite a parade," remarked Jack.
"Let's make it a race," suggested Cora, her dark eyes flashing in anticipation.
Jack glanced at Walter. The relations between him and Sid were rather strained. As for Ida—well, Ida was credited with "running after Walter," and the sentiment of lads toward such girls is too well known to need describing.
"Oh, yes! Do let us race!" chimed in Bess. "It would be such fun!"
"All right," agreed Jack. "That is, if Sid is, willing."
"Will you race, Sidney?" called Cora, before the occupants of the yellow car had had time to greet the others.
"Yes, certainly," he assented. "I would like nothing better."
"Then we'll have to handicap the girls," suggested Walter. "They have by far the fastest machine."
"But it's brand new," objected Cora, "and isn't tuned up yet, as the two runabouts are. Besides, look who we are—girls."
"Very charming ones, I'm sure," said Sid quickly, but, somehow, his voice did not ring true.
"Handicap," spoke Walter. "I suppose it's right, but you see—er—we fellows could—" He was floundering about for a way of saying that the girls should not be penalized by giving the drivers of the two runabouts a start. For, in spite of their small size and less power the runabouts were speedy cars. It seemed as if Walter did not want to take the obviously fair advantage due him.
"Oh, no," declared Cora. "We'll let you handicap us all you wish.We are willing to test the Whirlwind on its merits."
"I should think so," sneered Ida, and then she turned disdainfully away, as if the landscape held more of interest for her than did the details of a race.
"Who is that forward girl?" asked quiet Mary of Bess.
"Ida Giles," was the whispered reply.
"She looked at me as if I did not belong in a motor car," went on the little milliner, with that quick perception acquired by business experience.
"Well, she doesn't belong in the one she's in," retorted Bess kindly. "I guess you imagine she meant something like that. Ida is not really mean. She is merely thoughtless."
"That's the very meanest kind of meanness," insisted Mary, "for, when folks do a thing through thoughtlessness they do not know enough to be careful next time."
Bess smiled to assure Mary that the milliner's model was on an equal footing with the girls in the Whirlwind, at all events.
"Line up!" called Jack. "Get ready for the race. We'll not insist on a handicap for you, Cora."
Sid sent his car directly to the middle of the road, the very best place.
"Better let the touring car go there," suggested Walter in as even a tone as he could command. "It will need lots of room, and the road's not very wide."
"That's right," added Jack. "A runabout can go on either side, then."
"I don't know," began Sid. "Cora ought to beat, and yet with two fellows driving against her—"
"Oh, if it's a matter of girls," almost sneered Ida, "I'll drive theStreak."
"Good idea!" hurriedly spoke Jack. "That will `make the match even.Suppose we take a girl to drive our car, Walter?"
Walter glanced rather ruefully at his companion.
"Why—er—yes," he drawled. "Suppose we take—"
"Bess," finished Jack, quickly. "She knows considerable about a car, and she's driven this one."
Somehow, the idea of having Bess as a rival to Ida suggested fun toJack.
"Now we have it," went on Cora's brother, as Bess alighted from theWhirlwind and entered the Get There. "Are we all ready?"
"Where's Walter going?" asked Cora, for he had given up his seat to Jack, who moved to make room for Bess. Mary, Cora and Belle were in the touring car.
"I guess I'd better get into the big machine,", decided Walter. "Three such pretty girls in it all alone are an unequal division of beauty and talent—the last for myself, of course."
He moved toward the Whirlwind. Ida frowned. She had rather hoped to have matters so arranged that Walter would be with her. Cora saw the frown and laughed merrily as Walter slipped into the seat beside her.
"I suppose you think you are going to do the mascoting for this car," she said.
"At your service, mademoiselle," replied Walter, trying to bow, a politeness rather difficult of accomplishment in a small seat. "Do anything you like, but don't run me into the ditch. My watch is deadly afraid of ditches."
Then Cora introduced Mary, the little model blushing refreshingly.
Walter made a mental note of Mary's eyes, and the soft tints, like the bloom of a peach, in her cheeks. The two other girls were not slow to observe his interest. It was odd, thought Cora, how boys go in for the romantic sort—and models!
"All ready?" called Jack again.
Ida shook her head. She looked critically at the clutch lever, from her seat at the wheel, which Sid had relinquished to her. The lever was not properly adjusted, and she called her companion's attention to it.
Sid shifted it, and then Walter called from his seat beside Cora.
"All ready here!"
"It's about time," murmured Jack, jokingly.
The cars, which had been cranked, were "chug-chugging" away, and vibrating with the speed of the unleashed motors. Three clutch pedals were released, and the three cars moved forward. There was a grinding of gears, as Ida threw in a higher speed. Her hand and ear were not quite true, but to the surprise of the others her car darted ahead. It was speedier than had been thought.
It was a beautifully clear road, and the machines were now fairly flying along it. Bess clung desperately to the wooden rim of the steering wheel of Jack's car.
"Keep her straight," he cautioned. "Don't work so hard at it. An auto is like a horse—a light, firm touch is what it needs."
"Um!" murmured Bess. She was afraid to open her mouth lest she should lose her breath in the wind.
"Look out for that wagon!" Walter suddenly called to Cora.
A clumsy vehicle was some distance in advance, and seemed to be standing still, so slow was the movement. Ida was nearer to it than the others, and as she passed it she swung safely to one side, giving several disconcerting blasts on the horn as she did so. She was proving herself a good driver.
Somehow Bess had managed to distance the big car and had swung to second place. Cora thought she had her machine going at full speed, but either it had not "warmed up" yet, or she was not properly feeding the gasolene, and had not correctly adjusted the sparking device.
Just as Cora was about to pass the wagon, which feat Bess had now safely negotiated, the old man driving it seemed to awaken from a nap. He appeared to remember something he had forgotten and pulled his horses to one side—the wrong side—toward Cora's car, which was rushing right at him! The Whirlwind was almost upon the wagon!
"Mercy!" screamed. Mary. "We'll be smashed!"
"Steady!" called Cora, though her face went white.
Walter reached over, as if to take the wheel from the girl. She stopped him by a shake of her head, and then braced herself for what was coming. She screamed at the top of her fresh, clear voice:
"Stop! stop! Don't turn! stop!"
The farmer heard just in time. He fairly pulled the horses back on their haunches, and the wagon came to a stop. There was barely room for the auto to get past, but Cora managed it.
"Oh!" sighed Mary in thankfulness. "Wasn't that awful?"
"A narrow escape," assented Isabel. "But not as bad as the other one was. You should have seen that! We're safe now."
The Whirlwind careened along the road, from the shelving gutter back into the middle of the highway.
"Why didn't you let me take the wheel?" asked Walter, looking atCora in a strange sort of way.
"I couldn't seem to let go," she said with a nervous little laugh. "I knew, of course, that you could run it more safely than I could, but somehow I couldn't seem to let go. My fingers appeared to be glued to the wheel."
"I certainly could not have done better," admitted Walter. "But I thought I might help you. Look at Ida, though! She is going like grim death."
"If she doesn't encounter another farmer she may be all right," said Cora. "But I wonder why I don't go faster. Oh, no wonder. I'm on second speed. I forgot to throw in the high gear. Here it goes. Now watch me pass them."
She advanced the lever, and the car shot forward. It was going at a greatly increased speed, and easily passed Bess and Jack.
"Here's where we leave you," called Cora.
"It's about time," replied Jack. "I thought something was wrong with you.
"Third gear," answered Cora. "Forgot I had it." Her voice floated back on the wind.
With a merry shout she turned on more gasolene and advanced the spark. She was almost up to Ida.
The race was to end at a bridge, which was only a few rods ahead.
"Careful," cautioned Walter to the fair driver beside him. She was making some rather reckless curves.
"I'm all right," declared Cora.
"I'm sure we'll win," exclaimed Mary.
The Whirlwind was now close to Sid's car. He heard it coming and looked around. Then he caught the steering wheel from Ida, leaning over to reach it.
"Foul!" shouted Walter. "That's not allowed!"
"Never mind!" panted Cora. "I'm not afraid to let him steer. I can beat him!"
Jack stood up in his machine. He was angry, and showed it in his face.
"Stop, sis," he called to Cora. "The race is yours. Don't pass him."
"She can't!" retorted Sid.
"Oh, I'm afraid!" gasped Bess, beside Jack. "He's steering right in front of her to cut her off. He won't turn out."
Then, as if realizing that the race would be counted lost to them for Sid's violation of the rules, Ida tried to displace the hands of her, companion from the wheel.
"Let me steer!" she exclaimed. "I want to! Let me, Sid!"
"No!" he answered angrily. "I'm going to run it now."
The car was swaying from side to side because of the erratic motion imparted to it, due to the struggle between Sid and Ida to gain possession of the wooden circlet.
"Let me take it! I want to beat her!" spoke Ida in a tense whisper, and Sid, with a queer look at her, nodded.
He released his grip of the wheel, and again Ida took it in a firm grasp. But the change was not skillfully enough made, and the next moment the Streak cut diagonally across the road, right in front of the Whirlwind.
"Oh!" screamed Cora, in spite of herself, and Bess and Mary added their frightened cries. Cora swung the wheel as far to the right as it would go. There was a grinding sound as she threw on the emergency brake, and the powerful clutch of it held the rear wheels in so firm a grip that the big rubber tires fairly slid along the road.
"Sid," cried Ida, "they'll collide with us! Do something! Do it quick!"
He stood up and tried to take Ida's hands from the wheel again, but she seemed to have lost her head. The big car was still careening toward them, though the brakes were slowing it up. Then Ida, with a flash of instinct, did the only thing possible. Instead of putting on brakes and trying to stop, she pressed the accelerator pedal, and the little car shot forward at a momentarily increased speed. Between them Ida and Sid managed to steer it into a ditch, and brought up with a crash against a fence, splintering the rails. Ida, with more force than she thought she possessed, jammed on the brakes, and the Streak, with a groan and a jar, came to a stop.
Then there came a jolt, a ripping sound, and Cora's big, four-cylindered machine banged into the Streak, for, in spite of all Cora and Walter could do, the Whirlwind could not be stopped in time.
But, fortunately, the damage to the large car was not great, for as she saw that a collision was inevitable, Cora had quickly shifted the wheel, and but a glancing blow had been struck. A mud guard was torn from the Whirlwind. Only Cora's plucky driving, and her emergency stop, had prevented a worse accident.
"Well," remarked Sid in a strange voice, "we're alive, at any rate."
"Yes," added Bess sharply, "and no thanks to somebody, either."
"If you mean me—" began Sid, the color flaming into his face.
"Look at your radiator!" suddenly exclaimed Walter. "It's sprung a leak!"
A stream of water, trickling down from the front of the Streak testified to this. A piece of the broken fence rail had jammed into the radiator, puncturing several coils and bending others out of place.
"No more go in her," observed Sid ruefully. "We'll have to be towed back home."
"Is your car damaged much, Cora?" asked Walter, for the girl had leaped out and was critically examining the auto.
"Only the mud guard," she replied as she reached up to the steering wheel, touched the levers and shut off the engine.
For a few minutes every one seemed to be talking at once, and there was considerable confusion. Sid and Ida came in for a number of rather angry glances, for the mishap seemed to be due entirely to their thoughtless conduct, and that their runabout had been the most damaged did not appear to lessen their offense.
Walter took the wheel of the Whirlwind, which Cora gladly relinquished to him, and soon had the car out of the ditch and upon the highway. The Streak, of course, could not move under its own power for more than a short distance, as the water had all leaked out of the radiator, and, there being none to cool the cylinders, to operate it was to invite disaster. Jack and Bess had alighted from the Get There. Jack was very angry.
"Nice way to race!" he exclaimed. "I've got a good mind to—do something to you, Sid Wilcox!"
"Oh, you have, eh?" sneered Sid. "Well, I don't know but what I might like to take it out of you for your sister cutting so close across my course. I guess I'm the one to get mad."
"You sneak! She did nothing of the sort!" cried Jack.
"Oh, Jack! Please don't!" begged his sister. "If it was my fault,I'm ready to apologize."
"Your fault!" exclaimed Walter. "It wasn't your fault at all. It was—er—well, Sid and Ida were to blame."
"That's the way it looked to me," declared Cora.
Ida stared at Jack's sister for a moment, and then, with an open sneer on her face, turned deliberately away.
"Oh, I'm so glad we escaped, anyhow!" ejaculated Mary Downes. Her voice attracted Sid's attention. He had not noticed the little work girl before. At first he appeared to scowl, and then he smiled most pleasantly. The action was not lost upon Belle, though Cora, puzzling over Ida's manner, had not seen it.
"Come on, get in, girls," called Walter from his seat in the touring car. "No use standing there in the sun."
"You've got to tow me," ordered Sid in a peremptory manner.
"Got to?" repeated Walter, with a curious inflection.
"Hush!" whispered Cora. "Let's do it, Walter. Jack is so angry at him that I'm afraid something will happen."
"Very well. Just as you say," replied Walter gallantly.
Jack turned away in disgust. He was evidently trying hard to keep his temper under control.
"That he and Ida should deliberately endanger the lives of several people, to say nothing of their own risk, seems past belief," Jack murmured to Walter. "I've a good mind to teach him a much-deserved lesson. We ought to leave him to walk home."
"Oh, I do dislike rows!" exclaimed Cora, and she whispered in Jack's ear: "Don't bother with him, Bud. He isn't worth it."
"You're right about that," was the response, and the lad looked affectionately at his sister. She had gotten over the momentary fright, and there was now a pretty flush on her face. "I'll overlook it this time, sis," went on Jack. "Perhaps he'll get his lesson later—without me having to give it to him."
"Aren't some of you going to tow me?" asked Sid rather disconsolately. "I can't run my car the way it is."
"Don't ask any favors of them," Cora heard Ida whisper to Sid."We'll walk."
"I will not," he answered sharply. "I'm not going to leave my car here. Will you give me a tow, Cora?" he asked. "Seeing that you made me smash—"
"She did not!" cried Jack. "And if you say so you're—"
"Jack!" exclaimed his sister.
"Well, he knows it was his own fault," concluded Jack, not wishing to accuse Ida.
Sid looked a bit worried.
"We'll tow you," said Cora simply.
"Thank you," responded Sid.
"Got a rope?" asked Walter.
"Here's one," answered the owner of the Streak, producing a strong rope from the rear of his runabout.
"Looks as if you were in the habit of getting towed," remarkedWalter.
"Yes. I've had bad luck with this car."
Sid and Walter were soon busy arranging the two cars, so that the big auto would tow the disabled one.
"I want the boys to separate," whispered Cora to Bess. "I'm soAfraid Jack and Sid will quarrel."
"Not if they keep as far apart as they are now," was the answer, for Jack had gotten back into his own car, and was looking on. Ida, too, seemed to keep herself at a distance from the other girls.
"Well, I guess that will hold," remarked Walter as he put the last knot in the rope.
"Here comes Ed Foster!" suddenly exclaimed Jack as the puffing of an auto was heard and a machine came in sight. "Now I guess we're all here. Hello, Ed!"
"Hello, yourself," replied Ed. "Well, what's up now? Somebody turned turtle?"
"No, but somebody's turned—" began Jack, on the point of saying something uncomplimentary about Sid, but Cora interrupted him.
"We had a race, and this is how I—that is, we—won it," she said with a laugh.
Ed stepped out of his car and walked to where Sid's silent machine stood.
"Radiator, eh?" he questioned. "A bad break."
"That's what. Cora collided with me—but it was partly my fault," added Sid quickly for jack's benefit.
"And look at my nice, new mud guard," spoke Cora. "See how it hangs down, like a dog's broken leg. Isn't it a shame? I guess we'll have to tear it off, so we can run."
"Let me look at it," suggested Ed. "Maybe I can spring it back into place."
"I never thought of that,"—remarked Walter.
Ed was searching in his tool-box, and presently drew out some strong string.
"I never go without a bit of cord, a knife and some pins for just such emergencies as these," he said with a laugh. "I never know when I may be shipwrecked on a desert island."
Ed skillfully sprung the guard back, and as one of the rivets was torn out, he lashed the protector into place. It was only a temporary repair, but it would protect the occupants of the car from a shower of dust or mud.
"There," said Ed finally. "I guess that will answer. The road ahead is pretty muddy. Too much moisture from a sprinkling-cart, I guess. I caught some of it."
Cora turned to see if everything was in readiness for a start, and was surprised to find Mary in close conversation with Ida. Both girls and Sid were in a group an the other side of the Whirlwind. And another thing Cora noticed was that the faces of both Ida and Mary were unusually flushed.
"That's rather odd—that Mary and Ida should get so chummy," murmured Cora. "Sid must have introduced them to each other:"
A moment later Ida looked over, and seeing Cora watching her, she quickly turned away and walked over to where Ed was locking up his toolbox. She placed her hand on the seat of his small auto and began talking to him.
"I hear you are going into business," Cora heard Ida say.
"Well, not exactly business," replied Ed. "I'm going to have some interest in the bank at New City."
"Oh, yes. I heard about it."
"Say, Ed, have you all that—" began Jack, and then he stopped quickly. He had been on the point of asking Ed if he had with him the twenty thousand dollars in cash and negotiable securities, but he quickly reflected that such a question was not a proper one to ask on a public road.
"Got what?" inquired Ed with a laugh, but at the same time Cora saw him frown slightly at her brother.
"I meant to say, have you any of those fish with you that we caught last time?" asked Jack, laughing rather uneasily.
"Yes, I have them," replied Ed, which was his way of replying toJack's implied question.
"Going over to New City?" asked Sid, coming around from an inspection of the broken radiator.
"Yes; I've some business over there, and as it's getting late I'll have to hurry. I'll bid you all good-by. Hope you get safely home."
Ed jumped into his car, which he had quickly cranked up, and called a general farewell.
"So long," answered Jack.
"Come on," called Walter, as Ed's car puffed out of sight. "We'll have a load to pull now, Cora."
"Perhaps I had better get in with Jack and Bess," remarked Belle."We can manage it—if we squeeze some."
Then she blushed, and everybody laughed.
"The more the merrier," replied Jack. "I think it will be a good idea, though. We'll get home quicker than Cora and her tow will."
Belle climbed into the Get There. This left Cora alone with Walter in the big car. Ida and Sid stood on the ground, apparently waiting for an invitation to get in somewhere.
"I'll have to steer my car," said Sid. "You had better get inCora's machine, Ida, for it's no fun riding in a towed auto."
"Yes, do come in here," said Cora quickly, but Ida hung back and looked miserably unhappy.
"Come on," and Walter added his invitation. "I'm going to be the 'shuffler,' and I may as well have something worth while to 'shuffle' while I'm at it."
Ida smiled at this. It was evident that she could not resist after this appeal—especially as it came from Walter, who found much favor in her eyes.
Ida climbed into the big car nimbly enough, and sat on the thick cushions in the roomy tonneau beside Mary.
"I guess she'd rather be in front," remarked Bess in a whisper toBelle, but she took care that Jack should not hear.
Walter started Cora's car off, and Sid's followed, with himself at the wheel, looking very glum. Jack brought up in the rear with the pretty twins.
The Whirlwind easily towed the weight of the disabled runabout, and the autoists were soon approaching town.
"Let me out at the post-office, please," begged Mary of Cora, as they rolled through the village streets. "I had better not let madam see me out riding."
"Why, she gave you permission, didn't she?" asked Cora in surprise.
"But I would rather get out here," insisted Mary, not answering the question directly.
"If you'll cast me loose, I'll run my machine in this shop," suddenly called Sid, as they passed a rather tumble-down shack on a side street.
"But you're not going to let old Smith tinker with it, are you?" asked Walter.
"Oh, I don't know what I'll do with it!" snapped Sid. "May as well leave it here as anywhere else."
Smith's place was a second-rate blacksmith shop, while at Chelton Center, a little farther on, there was a fine garage—Newton's—the one at which Cora and the twins had met the handsome machinist.
"Why don't you take it to Newton's?" asked Cora. "We'll go there with you. I—er—, I know the machinist there."
"I prefer to leave it here," said Sid shortly. "Stop, please, andI'll loosen the rope."
"Oh!" exclaimed Cora shortly. She could not understand Sid. Walter stopped her car, and before it had come to a full halt Sid was detaching the tow rope. Mary took this chance to alight from the Whirlwind, as they were not far from the post-office, and Ida followed her. Sid cranked up for the short run into the blacksmith shop. Ida and Mary were walking down the street together.
"Go ahead!" Sid called to Walter.
"Oh, you're welcome," replied Walter sarcastically. "Not the least trouble, thank you. Glad at any time—"
Sid shot at him an angry glance over his shoulder.
"I'd like to know who had a better right to haul me out of the ditch?" he said sneeringly.
Jack, with the twins, had run on. As Walter started Cora's machine off again, they saw a man coming out of the smithy. He helped Sid push the car in, and then stood talking with him in a friendly sort of fashion. The man's clothing was unkempt, and his general appearance anything but prepossessing.
"Who's that?" asked Cora.
"Him, you mean?" inquired Walter. "Oh, that's Lem Gildy. Or just plain Lem, if you like that better."
"What does he do?"
"Nothing. Easily said. Yet I've heard it remarked that he'd do anything for money."
"Curious that Sid should be on such friendly terms with such a character."
"Rather," remarked Walter, and he turned to see Sid pointing at the big car, while Lem Gildy was nodding his head as if assenting to something.
Edward Foster, as he ran his machine along the country road toward New City, where he was to transact his business at the bank, was thinking of many things. And not all of them were connected with the large sum of money and the bonds which he was to exchange for stock. A certain bright-eyed girl figured largely in his reveries.
"Guess I'd better put on a little more speed," he said to himself."It's going to take some time to get this all straightened out, andI don't like to have such a large sum with me on the road."
He speeded up his car, and was soon on the outskirts of the city, where he had to go slower, threading his way in and out among many vehicles.
He reached the bank shortly before noon, was greeted by the president and the secretary, who were expecting him, and was shown into a private office.
"Well, we have the stock all ready for you," said the president genially. It was not every day that his bank disposed of such a large block. "I trust you will find it a good investment."
"I believe I will," replied Ed as he reached his hand in his inner pocket to take out the wallet that contained the money and bonds. "I looked into—"
He stopped suddenly. A blank look came over his face. Hurriedly he felt in another pocket. Then he began a rapid search through his clothes.
"What's the matter?" asked the secretary. "Did you mislay your valuables?"
"Yes—no—I don't see—" murmured Ed. All the while he was making a frantic search. His face paled. The bank officials looked anxiously on.
"Can't you find it?" inquired the president.
"I've either lost my wallet,—or it's been stolen!" burst out Ed desperately.
"How could it have been stolen?" asked the secretary.
"I don't know," was the answer. "I don't see how it could have been, as, from the time it was in my pocket until now, I did not leave my auto—"
He stopped quickly. The memory of the scene alongside the road, where the machines had collided, came back to him with vivid distinctness. He had alighted there, and—
He pursued his reflections no further, but hurriedly got up from the chair.
"I must go back at once," he said. "I will make a search. I thinkI know where the loss may have taken place."
"Or the theft," suggested the president.
"No," said Ed slowly, "I don't believe it was a theft."
"Shall we send for a detective? Will you take one of our porters or a watchman with you?" asked the secretary.
"No; I think I'll make a search myself, first, thank you. And please don't tell the police—yet. I may have dropped it. I'll let you know as soon—as soon as I go to a certain place and look. There is time enough to notify the authorities afterward. I'll telephone you if I don't find it, and then I'll tell the police in Chelton. But I must hurry."
"Yes; you had better lose no time," advised the president.
"The thief—if there, was one—could easily dispose of those securities. As for the money—?"
"He would have no trouble in spending that," finished Ed. "Yes, I'll go back at once."
He hurried out to his auto, and was soon speeding back over the road on which he had come. He reached the spot where the auto collision had occurred, and where he had helped fix Cora's machine. Jumping from the car he looked carefully over the ground, but could find no trace of the missing wallet, containing the equivalent of twenty thousand dollars.
"I must hurry to tell the police," he murmured as he urged his machine forward at top speed. A little later Cora and Walter, who had returned to Chelton, saw Ed standing on the steps of the police station.
"Why!" Cora exclaimed to Walter in some surprise, "I thought Ed was in New City, attending to that bank business."
"He ought to be," commented Walter. Then, noting Ed's white face, he added: "Something's happened!"
A moment later Jack, who had left the Robinson twins at their home, drove up in his runabout, and stopped it beside his sister's larger car. He, too, saw Ed Foster's white face.
"What's the matter, Ed?" he called quickly. "Are you hurt?"
"No," was the answer, and the voice was strained.
"But something has happened," insisted Cora as she alighted from her car and started up the steps of the police station.
"Yes," he said, and his voice trembled, "something has happened."
"What?" asked Jack.
"I've lost twenty thousand dollars—or—else it has been stolen!"
"Twenty thousand dollars!" cried Jack. "The money you were taking to the bank?"
Ed nodded.
"Where?" was Jack's next question.
"That's what I don't know. If I did I'd go get it."
"But if it was stolen—" began Cora.
"The thief is far enough away from here now," finished Ed, trying to smile. "However, I think I lost it near where the collision took place. I just came from there to report the matter to the police."
"But how could you lose it?" asked Cora, taking off her heavy driving gloves and fanning her face with them.
"I don't know, unless when I leaned over to fix the mud guard of your auto the wallet may have slipped from my pocket. But I've looked every inch about that spot," and then Ed related how he had come to miss the money and securities.
"Oh, we must go back and help you look!" exclaimed Cora quickly."Of course we will, won't we, Jack—Walter?"
"Sure," replied her brother, and Walter gravely nodded. He was trying to recall every incident of the happenings after the collision.
"We'll go right away," went on Cora. "Crank up, Walter. Few persons go over that road in the afternoon, and maybe we can find it."
"Oh, I assure you that it's useless," declared Ed. "I am only waiting here to report the matter to Chief Jenkins, and then I'm going to telephone the officials at the bank in New City, as I promised I would."
"Can't you stop payment?" asked Jack.
"Not on the money, and not very easily on the negotiable securities.That's the unfortunate part of it. If it had been a check I could."
"Queer, I almost had a premonition that something might happen to that twenty thousand," said Jack slowly. "Though I suppose if I say that it makes it look bad for me," he added with a smile.
"Oh, no," Ed answered, seriously enough. "Of course not."
"Come on; let's hurry back," suggested Cora. She re-entered the car, which shook from the running of the ungeared motor that Walter had started for her.
"Really, Cora," began Ed, "it is useless for you to take the trouble to go back and hunt for it, though I'm sure it's very kind—"
"It's no trouble at all."
"But have you been home to dinner?" asked Ed.
"No. Walter and I stopped at a little wayside restaurant and had lunch. Come on, we'll hurry back to the place where the collision took place. I'm sure we'll find the wallet. I'm very lucky that way."
"Let me wish you the best of luck," said Ed with an attempt at gallantry. "I'd go with you, only I must give the chief all the particulars, in case it's stolen, you know. Then I must telephone to the bank."
"That's all right," put in Jack. "Go ahead. We'll make a hunt for that small fortune. Can I do anything for you here?"
"No, thanks. I think not. You are going to have a useless errand, though, I fear, but I appreciate what you are doing for me."
"Come on—hurry!" cried Cora, all impatient to be off, and then, when Walter climbed in beside her and Jack sent his car off, following the big machine of his sister, Ed disappeared behind the door of the police station.
"Here's where the collision occurred!" exclaimed Cora a little later, when her car and Jack's, having been sent at a fast speed down the road, came to a halt, and she directed her brother's attention to the spot.
"No, this isn't it," objected Walter. "It's farther on. It's right near an old stump, don't you remember?"
"Oh, yes," answered Cora as she sent her car ahead again. "This is where we nearly ran into the wagon. I'm so excited I can't think straight."
"Well, be sure you steer straight!" cried Jack from the rear. "I don't want to run into you. Better let Walter take the wheel."
"Indeed, I'll do nothing of the sort!" cried Cora, laughing. "With all due respect to you, Walter, of course," she added with a bright look up into the face of her companion. "But don't you think I can manage my machine pretty well?"
"More than pretty and more than well," was her escort's reply. "Jack is a base defamer of your ability."
"Oh, you had to say that, Walt!" cried Jack, the irrepressible. "Push on. We want to get that money before some one walks off with it."
They were soon at the spot, where many tracks in the road showed that there the collision had taken place. Here was where Ed had alighted to fix Cora's car. His small machine had on a set of peculiar tires, and the impressions and indentations of the rubber shoes, which were new, were plainly, visible in the road.
Stopping their machines alongside the highway, the three young people began a careful search of the dusty stretch. They went over every inch of the ground, particularly in the vicinity of the place where Ed had stopped to fix the broken mud guard. But there was no sign of the pocketbook.
"Maybe it was dropped farther back," suggested Jack.
"Well, we'll try there," assented Cora, and for ten minutes they walked up and down the road, some distance back from the place where Ed had alighted.
"Now try farther on," was Walter's suggestion, and they did this.
But all to no purpose. They were not rewarded by the welcome sight of a brown leather wallet, bulging with riches.
"It's no use," said Jack.
"Oh, let's try a little longer," begged Cora.
"Well, if he dropped it before he got here, or after he left, we might as well make the entire trip to New City, and then reverse and go to Chelton," went on Jack. "And we can't look over every inch of all the distance."
"We can drive along slowly," was Cora's idea. "The wallet is so large that it could easily be seen. It's too bad we haven't Sid and Ida along to help hunt for it. And the Robinson girls, and Mary. The more eyes, the better. I'll go on to New City, if you'll make a search on the road from here to Chelton, Jack."
"Oh, I don't know as it would do any good."
"It won't do any harm," said Walter. "That is, if Cora isn't too tired."
"Oh, I should love to go. I can't get enough of my new car. Will you come, Walter?"
"Of course."
"Then, Jack, you go back to Chelton and keep a lookout on both sides of the road."
"Hard to do that with one pair of eyes," was her brother's reply. "I wish I had some one to ride with me. But go ahead; I'll do the best I can."
"It would be a good plan," assented Cora, "to have a person with you. If you could pick up some one—"
"Or run across somebody," added Jack with a grin.
"No, Jack, I'm serious. Don't joke. Even a stranger would do. Some man—"
"Here comes a man now!" exclaimed Walter as an individual came in sight around a bend in the road. The man was not very well dressed.
"I don't like his looks," said Jack in a low voice. "He seems like a tramp."
"I don't blame you for not liking his looks," interrupted Walter."That's Lem Gildy."
"The man we saw talking to Sid when he ran his auto into the blacksmith shop?" asked Cora.
Walter nodded.
"Humph!" mused Jack. "I don't exactly fancy telling Lem Gildy about a pocketbook containing twenty thousand dollars lying alongside the road. He might not admit that he saw it if he happened to spy it while with me, and later on he might come back and pick it up."
"Well, don't tell him what you're looking for," suggested Cora with ready wit. "Just say it's—er—a—er—"
"Say it's a lady's pocketbook," put in Walter, "and then he'll know it's got everything in it but money. That's playing a safety with a vengeance."
"Oh, so that's your opinion of us, is it?" asked Cora quickly. "But, after all, Jack, I think it's the best plan to ask him to ride back with you, and have him watch one side of the road. Of course, he's rather dirty—I mean his clothes—and it's not nice to sit alongside of him, but—"
"Oh, I don't mind clean dirt," interrupted Jack. "It's only garden soil on Lem's clothes. He does odd jobs, you know."
"Not very often," added Walter. "But go ahead, Jack. He's coming nearer. I don't believe you can do better than ask him to ride back to Chelton with you. Needn't be too specific about what's in the pocketbook. But two pairs of eyes are better than one, you know."
"All right," assented Jack. "Here goes."
Lem Gildy was shuffling along the road. He was a particularly unprepossessing man, with a reddish growth of whiskers which he never seemed to take the trouble to shave off, and they stuck out like so many bristles in a half-worn toothbrush.
His teeth were yellow, and his habit of chewing tobacco was not to be commended. In short, he was a "shiftless" character, and nice persons had very little to do with him.
"Hello, Lem!" called Jack pleasantly.
"Hello," was the rather surly answer, and Lem shot a suspicious glance at Jack. It was not often that the young and wealthy Jack Kimball condescended to speak to Lem Gildy, and Lem realized it.
"Want a ride?" went on Jack, trying to make his voice sound natural.
"Don't look as if you was goin' my way," replied Lem with a grin. Then he turned his gaze on Cora, and the beautiful girl could not repress a shudder as she felt the bold glance of the man.
"Oh, I'm going to turn around," declared Jack. "I'm going back toChelton. That's where you're headed for, I take it?"
"Sure. That's where I'm goin', and I'm tired, too. I've had a long walk this mornin', and—"
"Are you working in the blacksmith shop?" asked Walter quietly.
"No. What made you think that?" asked Lem quickly. "If you think—"
Then he stopped suddenly. An indignant look, that Lem had assumed, faded from his face. "No, I wasn't workin' there," he went on. "I—er—I just stopped in to see about gettin' a piece of iron."
"Well, do you want to ride back with me?" asked Jack, who wondered at Walter's question.
"That's what I do, if you're goin' my way."
"Yes, I'll turn around in a minute. Go ahead, Cora and Walter. Get back as soon as you can."
Jack cranked up his car, got in, and, running in a half circle, steered it to where Lem was standing.
"I ain't much in the habit of ridin' in these here kind of wagons," remarked Lem with a smirk. "I hope nothin' happens t' us."
"I guess nothing will. But, Lem, I'm not going to give you a ride for nothing," said Jack.
The man drew back suspiciously. He had expected something like this, his manner seemed to say.
"I ain't got any money," he whined.
"No, it's not money," went on Jack. "I only want you to help me look for something."
"Look for Suthin'?"
"Yes; along the road."
"What's the matter? Lose part of your autymobil?"
"No; it's a pocketbook—a wallet."
"A wallet?" exclaimed Lem, with such suddenness that Jack started.
"Yes," cried the lad. "You don't mean to say you found it?"
Lem seemed agitated. He shuffled his feet in the dust.
"Me find a pocketbook?" he said at length with a short laugh. "Well,I guess not. I ain't in the habit of findin' such things as that.What kind was it, and what was in it?"
"It was a long one of brown leather," replied Jack, describing Ed's pocketbook and ignoring the question of what was in it. "A friend of mine dropped it along here, and we're helping him hunt for it. My sister and Mr. Pennington are going to look in one direction, and you and I'll look in the other."
Jack tried to make his voice sound friendly, but it was difficult work.
"You'll look on one side of the road, and I'll keep watch on the other," he went on.
"All right; I'm agreeable," said Lem with a leer. "I don't believe we'll find it, though—I ain't never very lucky."
He got into the auto beside Jack, and the two started off slowly. Cora and Walter also started, and the search for the missing twenty thousand dollars was continued.
Jack and Lem did not talk much on the way back. Lem Gildy was not an accomplished conversationalist, and Jack was too anxious to find the wallet to care for the distraction of talk. Several times he thought he saw the pocketbook, but each time it was a flat stone or a clod of dirt that misled him.
They reached Chelton, and Lem asked to be set down in a secluded street.
"Why?" asked Jack curiously.
"Because if some of me chums saw me ridin' in a swell wagon like this they'd never speak to me again," and Lem grinned and showed all his yellow teeth. "I was afraid we wouldn't find that pocketbook," he added.
"Well, maybe Cora will," said Jack.
"Yes," said Lem slowly, "maybe she will—or some one else will."
His tone was so peculiar that Jack asked quickly:
"What do you mean, Lem?"
"Oh, nothin'," and the fellow assumed an injured air. "Only if a pocketbook is lost, some one's bound to find it, ain't they?"
"I suppose so," assented Jack, and as he drove his car through the streets of Chelton, after the unsuccessful search, he found himself vainly puzzling over Lem's strange manner.
Then, as he was turning a corner, Jack caught sight of Ed.
"Hey!" he called.
Ed turned. There was a momentary look of hope on his face.
"Did you—" he began.
Jack sadly shook his head.
"No luck, eh?" went on Ed as he approached Jack.
"No; that is, Lem and I didn't have any."
"Lem—do you mean to say Lem Gildy?"
"Now, don't get nervous. I didn't tell him it was your pocketbook that was lost. You see, I had to have some one keep watch on one side of the road while I looked on the other, and he was the only one available."
Then Jack related the details of the search.
"I'm glad Lem doesn't know about it," went on Ed. "I heard to-day that he and Sid Wilcox have been seen together several times lately, and I'm not quite ready to have my loss made public—especially to Sid."
"Maybe Cora and Walter will have better luck," suggested Jack hopefully. "We won't hear from them for some time, though. Did you 'phone to the bank in New City?"
"Yes. I told them I couldn't get any trace of the wallet here, and, as you know, I have already notified the Chelton police. They have been making a quiet search about town, but I fear it will be hopeless."
"The bank people didn't say it had been turned in there, by any chance, did they?"
"No such good fortune," and Ed laughed uneasily. "Well, I'm going home now to get a list of the bonds and their numbers, as well as the numbers of the big bills. The police say they will want them when they send out a general alarm."
"But I thought you said you didn't want it generally known."
"I don't, until I have made a thorough search at home. It is barely possible that I took up the wrong wallet by mistake when I rushed out this morning. I have two that look exactly alike. I may have picked up the empty one, shoved it into my pocket, and lost that one. The one containing the bonds and cash may still be at my house. I am hurrying there to see. If I don't find it, the police are to send out a general alarm."
"I hope you find it."
"So do I. It means a big loss to me—almost my entire fortune gone.I don't know what I am going to do."
"Let's hope for the best," spoke Jack as cheerfully as possible, but there was a dubious look on his face as he watched Ed turn in the direction of his home.
But Ed found that he had made no mistake in the wallets. The empty one was safely in his room, but the one containing the twenty thousand dollars was—as he had feared—lost. He communicated this fact to the police, and soon the chief had ordered some handbills printed, describing the pocketbook and the contents, and offering a reward of five hundred dollars for the cash and bonds, Ed having agreed to pay this amount and ask no questions.
"Ha!" exclaimed Lem Gildy that night as one of the hastily printed bills came into his possession, "so this is the wallet they are lookin' for, eh? Twenty thousand dollars! But I knowed it all the while. As if Jack Kimball an' his sister could fool me! But I'll bleed him—that's what I'll do. I'll make him whack up—or—or I'll tell!" and Lem chuckled to himself, while there was a dangerous look on his mean face.
The search conducted by Cora and Walter was, as might be guessed, as unsuccessful as the one undertaken by Jack and Lem. Cora and Walter looked carefully over the whole length of the road to New City, but saw nothing of the wallet, and came back disconsolate in the auto.
"Poor Ed!" remarked Walter. "It's tough luck!"
"Yes, I wish we could have found it for him," agreed Cora as she skillfully drove the car through the Chelton streets at dusk. "I'm beginning to believe that it was stolen."
"I think so myself," added Walter. "But if he had it when he was fixing your car, and he missed it directly after he left our crowd—"
He hesitated a moment, then continued:
"Well, maybe he thinks that some of us may have—"
"Better not jump at conclusions," cautioned Cora, and at this Walter alighted near the street that led to his home.
"I won't," he promised Cora with a laugh as she sent the car ahead. She was anxious to reach home and learn the details of Jack's search, though she and Walter knew, from an inquiry they had made at the bank in New City, that it had not been successful.
That night nothing was so important a topic of conversation in Chelton as the loss of the twenty thousand dollars. Speculation was rife, and opinion was equally divided on the question of whether it had been lost or stolen, or both, for that it might have been stolen after it was lost was possible.
Ed consulted some business friends, but they could give him little help. He was advised to hire private detectives, and said he would do so, in case the police of New City or Chelton could do nothing.
It was two days after the loss of the money and bonds that Cora, with her inseparable friends, the Robinson twins, and Walter, whom she had picked up on the road, were out for a ride. They took the turnpike, as it was the smoothest highway.
"We may meet Jack along here," said Cora as she turned out to avoid a large rock.
"Yes?"—asked Elizabeth, and she tried to keep down the eagerness in her voice.
"Yes; he's gone over to see about a concert his mandolin club is going to give, and he said he might bring a couple of the members back with him to stay a few days."
"College lads?" asked Bess with a laugh.
"Surely," replied Cora; "and charming ones, too, I gathered fromJack's talk."
"Must be some of the Never Sleep members," spoke Walter.
"Never Sleep members?" repeated Elizabeth.
"Yes; I belong. We call ourselves that because we used to be up at all hours. Some of the boys play in Jack's mandolin club."
"I hope we meet them!" exclaimed Bess frankly. "I'm dying for some music."
"Let me sing and save your life," proposed Walter.
"With pleasure," answered Bess, making a little gesture of surprise."But I didn't know you sang."
"Only to save life," replied Waiter. "But," he added, "if I'm not mistaken that sounds like Jack's car."
"It is," declared Cora, who was getting to be an expert on the puffing sounds of autos. "There he is!" she exclaimed as Jack's runabout came in sight. "And it's pretty well crowded, too."
It was, for in the car, which would barely hold three, Jack had managed to squeeze four—three lads besides himself.
"Hello, sis!" he called as he caught sight of Cora. "You're just in time. Take one of these brutes out of here, will you? My springs are breaking."
"I'll go!" cried one lad as he caught sight of the Robinson twins.
"No, I saw 'em first!" exclaimed another.
"You did not! It's my turn to ride in a decent car," said the third.
"Now, just for that you will all three get in Cora's car, and I'll take the Misses Robinson in with me," declared Jack.
There was laughter at this, and Jack introduced his mandolin club friends to Cora and the twins.
"Seriously, though, sis, you'll have to take one or two of 'em," went on Jack. "Here, Diddick, you and Parks go in the big car. I want to talk to Youmans about the concert we're going to have."
Diddick and Parks gladly made the exchange into the larger car, while Youmans tried to look as if he liked to remain with Jack. But it was hard work to imagine it when he glanced across at the pretty twins and Cora.
"Hold on a minute," exclaimed Walter as he noticed that one of the rear tires of the touring car was flat. "We can't go on like this, Cora. That left tire will have to be pumped up."
"And you've got good muscles to do it, too, Walter," urged Diddick, smiling mischievously.
"We'll all help," volunteered Parks. "Come on!"
Diddick, Walter and Parks alighted. Walter stepped to the tool-box to get out the pump and the lifting-jack. As he was about to take them out he started back excitedly.
"Hurt yourself?" asked Cora, who was looking over the side of the car.
Walter shook his head. His face was strangely white as he spoke in a husky voice:
"The wallet! Ed Foster's wallet in the tool box—here—see!"
He held the pocketbook up to view.
"Where—where did you get it?" gasped Cora.
"In—in—your—tool—box!"
"What?"
The girl's voice was shrill, and there was a tremor in her tones. Cora fairly leaped out beside him. She was staring at the brown leather wallet the wallet that had contained the twenty thousand dollars.
"How on earth—" she began.
She reached out her hand for the pocketbook. Walter gave it to her.She raised up the flap, and uttered but a single word:
"Empty!"
The limp wallet fell from her hand to the ground. Cora's face turned strangely white, and she began swaying, as does a tree that a woodsman has nearly cut through.
A moment later the overwrought girl staggered and almost fell intoWalter's arms.