CHAPTER XXIV
AN OBSTACLE RACE
AN OBSTACLE RACE
AN OBSTACLE RACE
They reached the station on High street, Greenbaugh, with a few minutes to spare. There were four cars already standing at the Carpenter House, the best hotel in the place. It was too expensive an inn for the Speedwell boys, however, and they drove around to another hostelry on a side street.
Besides, the Carpenter House veranda, and the yard, and the street in front of the hotel, were full of shouting, chaffing students from the seminary. Whether Chance Avery was so very popular with his former fellow students, or not, there was a great number interested in the motor car race.
“We want to keep away from them. Then we’ll be sure to escape trouble. I don’t want to talk with Chance just now,” said Dan Speedwell. “For I’m sore and I might say something I’d be sorry for later.”
“He played us as mean a trick as ever was played,” declared Billy.
“He did indeed. But we have caught up with him again. He won’t get past the Carpenter House to-night.”
Which was a fact, for after Dan and Billy had cleaned up their car and had put their next day’s supply of gasoline under lock and key this time, to be sure of it, they went out on High street and saw Chance and Burton Poole with a crowd of college fellows, going to one of the students’ boarding houses for supper.
The Speedwells ate their own supper, and then walked about the town quietly. They learned that forty of the racing cars had reached Greenbaugh during the evening. The streets were crowded with sight-seers. Late in the evening the seminary boys made a demonstration.
They had fireworks on the campus and then paraded the streets in autos and afoot, Burton Poole’s car in the lead with great placards on it.
Red fire and a noisy demonstration accompanied the parade; but the town police kept good order. There was a big, six-seated car that belonged in the town, and was hired by the seminary boys. This had a prominent place in the parade, and the next morning, when Dan and Billy got out at daybreak, they saw this machine, loaded with noisy but sleepy-looking fellows, rolling down to the High street.
“They’ve made a night of it!” exclaimed Dan. “And I bet Chance and Burton have been with them. They’ll feel just like running an auto to-day—I don’t think!”
“All right. If they want to give themselves a handicap,” returned Billy, “I won’t complain.”
“Let’s hurry and get away. I don’t want to see Chance Avery to-day if I can help it.”
“You mean to keep ahead of him, then?” chuckled Billy.
“I’d like to.”
But when they ran their car out to the front of the Carpenter House, several of the contestants had already gotten under way, and among them was Burton Poole’s machine. The big automobile crowded with students accompanied it out of town. Number seven had nearly half an hour’s start of the Speedwells’ car.
But the Breton-Melville ran very easily. No cars passed the boys for the first five miles. Then they saw a cloud of dust ahead and realized that they were catching up with the students—and probably Poole’s car.
The six-seated observation car could not run very fast, and it was so broad and heavy that it occupied more than a fair share of the road. Dan and Billy could not see beyond this elephantine car, and did not know how near number seven was.
The road was good and their motor had been running very nicely. As the big car, with its cheering crowd, continued to fill the road, Dan was obliged to pull down a little.
“Hoot again,” said Billy. “We want to get by. If Chance and Burton want to play horse along the way, let them. We’re out for the gold cup.”
At that moment an auto came up behind them and slid by swiftly. It was number twelve. When this car came up with the big omnibus, one of the students on the back seat yelled something to the man managing the car, and it swerved out just enough to let number twelve by.
Dan tried to follow. But before he could get the nose of number forty-eight into the opening, the omnibus swung back into the middle of the road again. The highway was narrow. There was no sidewalk on either hand. It was a typical country road and on either hand was a steep bank down to a barbed wire fence. To go into the ditch would finish any car!
“Hey there!” yelled Billy, standing up. “Let us by. Don’t hog the road, fellows.”
“Who are you, sonny?” returned one of the smart boys on the back seat.
“Let ’em sit up and beg proper,” suggested another of the seminary youths.
“Take your turn, brother,” advised another of the students. “We’ve got the road now and we mean to keep it.”
“Be still, Billy,” advised Dan, quickly. “They can hold us back but a little way. The road widens soon!”
But Dan was not a good prophet that time. The students evidently intended to hold back Chance Avery’s rival at any cost. Within five minutes, after guying the Speedwells unmercifully, and holding them down to a snail’s pace, the chauffeur of the heavy car suddenly brought it square across the road, backed a little, and then halted. His car was an effectual barrier to all traffic, going in either direction!
“Oh! Oh! Oh! Some-thing’s-bust-ed!” yelled the gang in chorus.
Dan and Billy then got a sight of the road ahead. It was empty. Chance was perhaps ten miles ahead, or more. And the Speedwells were stalled. The driver of the students’ car could claim that he could not move his auto. There were no policemen about. The following contestants might be held here for an hour, or more.
Dan and Billy were helpless. And the students were having a fine time at their expense. Dan had to fairly threaten his brother to keep Billy silent; to enter into a wordy discussion with the fellows would only have pleased the scamps toowell. They were primed to make sport of the Riverdale boys and undoubtedly would have handled them roughly had Dan allowed Billy to loosen his tongue.
For ten minutes the big car stood there, the chauffeur making believe fumble with the mechanism. Then suddenly there sounded a warning automobile horn from the direction of Greenbaugh. A car, in a cloud of dust, was dashing over the road toward them.
“Now, by jings!” exclaimed Billy, “they’ll have to do something.”
“No reason why they shouldn’t hold up the whole string of contestants for a while,” muttered Dan. “Wait.”
But this car did not seem to be one of the racers. At least, it had no placard on it. Suddenly Billy exclaimed:
“Isn’t that Mr. Briggs’ car? He’s caught up with us!”
“It’s not numbered,” objected Dan.
“I don’t care! It’s maroon—and a big car——”
Meanwhile the students on the omnibus did nothing toward pulling out. The maroon car reduced speed abruptly. There were three men in it—a small one at the wheel and two others in the tonneau. All were coated and masked with dust goggles.
“What’s the matter with you?” demanded one of the men in the tonneau, standing up.
Billy caught Dan by the hand, and whispered:
“It’s him!”
Dan needed no explanation. He knew what his brother meant at once. This was the leader of the trio of bank robbers—the motor thieves. Billy knew the fellow’s voice.
A chorus of contradictory explanations were shouted by the seminary boys. It was plain that they proposed to hold up this car, too, rather than let the Speedwells by.
“You can’t move your car, eh?” snapped the man in the maroon auto.
He sprang out fearlessly and strode to the side of the huge machine. As he started to climb up to the front seat one of the fellows tried to push him back.
That particular seminary student was instantly treated to the surprise of his life. The man reached out, seized the boy’s collar, and ripped him from his hold on the car. He pitched him bodily, with one fling, into the ditch beside the road.
He then vaulted into the chauffeur’s seat, seized the lever, and started the machine. The engine was still running. Instead of starting it ahead, the man deliberately backed the car into the ditch on the other side of the road, and leaped down, leaving it there with its forward wheels in the air!
Half the students had tumbled off when the car bounced into the ditch. The maroon machine was brought by the chauffeur past the disabled omnibus, and the man who had wrecked it leaped into his own machine again.
“Quick, Billy!” whispered Dan. “We’ll get after them.”
Their own car was ready. They ran right around the big machine, in the wake of the maroon auto. The latter was speeding away along the narrow road.
“We must catch them, Dan!” cried Billy, as number forty-eight began to hum again.
“We will indeed,” agreed his brother. “It’s the robbers’ car—no doubt of it. We must hang to them until we find an officer to make the arrest. Whatever happens—whether we win the race for the golden cup, or not, we must not let that maroon car escape this time!”