NO AUTOMOBILES ALLOWED
“Jerry,” says Poppy, as we sort of hurtled down the sandy country road
at the hair-raising speed of six miles an hour, or less, “that lawyer
is a crook.”
“He almost got his nose crooked,” I grinned, remembering the fracas on
the porch of the big stone house.
“He hates Ma Doane, of course--we could easily see that--but there’s
more than spitework back of his threat to get the sheriff.”
“You think he’s got a _reason_ for wanting to kick the others out of
the house?”
“Absolutely. He talked big about his _duty_ to the dead man. But that
was all bluff. ‘Dollars’ is a bigger thing in his mind than ‘duty.’ You
wait and see if I haven’t got the right line on him.”
“The dope about the granddaughter’s visit didn’t seem to tickle him for
two cents.”
“I’ll tell the world it didn’t. And right there is where we pick up
a clew, kid. He doesn’t want her to come here and use the house.
Furthermore, he doesn’t want Ma Doane or anyone else living there. See?
That’s why he’s getting the sheriff.”
“He knows what’s in the will--Ma said so.”
“Sure thing. And if he’s actually trying to keep the family of the dead
man out of the house, as we think, it’s a pretty safe bet that he’s
doing it to line his own pockets. For, as I say, he struck me as being
an old money grabber. You know what I mean--the ‘Shylock’ kind. And I
don’t think he cares a whang whether he gets his money honestly or not.
Men of his stamp usually show in their faces what they are. And the
rogues’ gallery never held a crookeder face than his.”
“Maybe,” says I, “he’s back of the granddaughter’s disappearance.”
Poppy considered that for a moment or two, then slowly shook his head.
“I hardly think so, Jerry. For you must remember that he was dumb on
her trip here until Ma spilt the beans over the telephone. And to that
point, it may have been information that he was after this morning more
than anything else.”
“Information about the girl?”
“Sure thing.”
“He didn’t get much out of Ma.”
“He knows that she’s coming.”
“Gee! I wish we could find her.”
“I haven’t much hopes that we will.”
“But you said we would,” I reminded.
“We’ll try, of course. But we haven’t much to work on--you can see
that. If we do find her, or get the slightest trace of her, it’ll be
more luck than anything else.”
“I always was lucky,” I grinned. “One time I found a horseshoe in Main
Street, and when I was picking it up Mr. Kaar’s hearse came along
behind me and wrecked my back porch.”
But this clever little skit was wasted on old sober-sides.
“Say, Jerry,” came thoughtfully, “do you suppose the spy is a tool of
the lawyer’s?”
I looked at him, puzzled.
“But you said the spy and old Ivory Dome are in cahoots.”
“Yes,” he nodded, “I did say that--but it was just a rough guess.”
“You’re doing too much rough guessing,” I told him. “You’re getting
me all mixed up. For if old Ivory Dome and the spy aren’t working
together, and the old man didn’t sneak out of bed last night to let the
other in, what _did_ he go downstairs for? When I first saw him he was
trying to open the kitchen door.”
“That’s so,” says Poppy thoughtfully.
“What gives you the idea,” I then inquired, “that the lawyer and the
spy are mixed up together?”
“As I say, the lawyer doesn’t want the granddaughter in the house.
There’s something in the will, I think, that favors him if he can keep
her away. So, learning from Ma that the girl was coming, he may have
sent some one out to the big house to stop her.”
“Then the storm came up and the spy got his shirt tail wet, huh?”
“Yes, and a certain other guy whom you hang around with more or less
got _his_ shirt tail wet, too.”
“You’re sure,” I pinned him down, “that the spy wasn’t old fatty,
himself?”
“Jerry! Don’t you suppose I can tell a hippopotamus from a rat?”
“All right,” I laughed. “We’ll take it for granted that the spy was
Lawyer Chew’s hired man and not old hippo himself. And we’ll further
take it for granted that the spy saw you in the storm and got scared
out. _But_--as the goat says, how about old Ivory Dome? Where does
_he_ come in? We know about some of his tricks; and we know that he’s
fooling his wife. I can’t make myself believe, though, now that we’ve
talked it over this way, that he’s on Chew’s side.”
“Nor me,” says Poppy quickly. “I’d sooner think that he was working
_against_ Chew on the granddaughter’s side, though what his game is
in playing ghost and slamming doors I can’t imagine. It seems to me,
too, that he ought to be able to trust his own wife. And to that point,
you’d naturally think that the woman would be at the head of any secret
plans to help the granddaughter, instead of _him_.”
“Half the time,” says I, “I think he’s D-U-M-B, and nothing else but.”
“Here, too. Yet we caught him in tricks. So it’s all right for us to be
suspicious of him. That dumb look of his may be just a sort of mask.”
“Say, Poppy,” I then laughed.
“Well?”
“I’ve got an idea about that gander.”
“_You_ with an idea! Be good to it, kid, for it’s in a strange place.”
“The old man was sent to the Pardyville depot to get the granddaughter.
See? But _he_ knew it was dangerous for the girl to come here. Old Chew
was liable to cut her throat, or something. And so--”
“For the love of mud!” squeaked the listener. “What have you been
reading?--a dime novel?”
“Anyway,” says I, “old Chew was liable to do something to her. So Ivory
Dome tells her to hide in Pardyville. See? And then she gives him her
pet gander. And she says: ‘You take the gander home with you. And as
soon as it’s safe for me to come tie a note to its tail--’”
“It’s _tail_!” whooped Poppy.
“I mean its hind foot,” I corrected. “She tells him that. See? And the
scheme is for the gander to take to the air and carrier-pigeon the note
to her.”
_Bang!_ Something under the hood sneezed its shirt off. And jumping for
my life, I landed on my snoot in the middle of the sandy road.
“That’s what you get for your crazy talk,” the driver laughed at me,
when I got up, rubbing my skinned nose.
“What was it?” says I, letting out my neck at the smoking car. “A bomb?”
“Carburetor trouble,” says old monkey wrench, jabbing as unconcerned as
you please at something or other with a screwdriver.
So far in this chapter I haven’t said more than a mouthful or two
about the old junk-pile that we were escorting around. Nor have I said
anything to speak of about the road over which we were traveling, or
the general lay of the country. As a matter of fact, in carrying on
our gab, as I have written it down, we didn’t “say” this and that--we
yelled it. We had to in order to get our words into the other’s ears.
But I thought it might get kind of tiresome to you to have us yelling
back and forth like a couple of loud speakers. So I wrote it down
the other way--as though we were carrying on a very polite parlor
conversation.
As for the road, if you can imagine a pair of wheel ruts across the
most forsaken part of the Sahara Desert, that’s the kind of stuff we
had to travel over. Sand, sand and nothing but sand. The only place
where it wasn’t deep was where it was deeper. It’s a wonder the old car
navigated the road at all. And I didn’t blame it now for wanting to
lay down and rest--only I could have saved some skin on my nose if it
hadn’t used its sneezer on me. That was kind of unfair, I thought. For
I hadn’t picked on it.
As I have explained in an earlier chapter, this side road was a sort
of forgotten connecting link between C. H. O., the highway that was
closed, and C. H. P., the other east-and-west highway on the south side
of the river. According to our map there was a burg up ahead of us by
the name of New Zion, a community of “religious fanatics,” according
to Ma Doanes’ line, and it was here that we were to cross the river.
Two more miles of soft road beyond the river and then we would strike
Neponset Corners, the town that Lawyer Chew owned--only it wasn’t as
big as he was--two hundred population, I think. Yah, you can see now
how he came to be mayor and everything. All the voters owed him money,
and whether they wanted to vote for him or not they didn’t dare do
otherwise.
Well, to pick up my story, I bravely got back in my seat when Poppy
hung up the screwdriver and crowbar. Then away we went again ... almost!
“What’s the matter now?” says I, necking through the brass windshield
frame to see where the engine had gone to.
“I killed it,” confessed the chauffeur.
“Well,” says I, ready to overlook the crime, “it deserved it. But you
might have waited until we got home. For this is an awfully hot place
to hold a funeral.”
“Get out and wind ’er up, you bag of nonsense, and shut up.”
“Use the self-starter.”
“Say, what do you think this is?--a Rolls-Royce?”
“Yah, a Rolls-Rough.”
“Well, show your stuff, varlet. And when you get through, fold up the
crank and hang it on the radiator neck.”
“Don’t let the old tub run over me,” I cautioned.
“Trust me, kid,” bragged the driver.
“Have you got the brake set?”
“I’ve just been wondering, Jerry, if there _is_ a brake. There ought to
be one. But I haven’t been able to find it.”
“_Good_ night!” I yipped. “Suppose we came to the top of a hill?”
“Oh, we can go down the hills, all right.”
“Yah, I guess we can!--seventy miles an hour.”
“Say,” he threw out his chest, “don’t you suppose I know how to handle
this old bus?”
“My life isn’t insured.”
“Anyway,” came the grin, “you aren’t doing anything useful except
rattle around in the seat. So when we go down the hills you can jump
out and hold us back.”
“The human brake, huh?”
“And when we’re going up the hills,” was the further job that was
shoved at me, “you can get out and push.”
“One thing in my favor,” says I, “it isn’t a hilly country.”
Poppy and I have a lot of fun gabbing back and forth that way. It’s
crazy stuff, I know. But we get a kick out of it.
At ten o’clock we came within sight of a flock of dingy-looking houses.
According to our map this was New Zion. The road that we were on seemed
to be the town’s main street.
A big weather-beaten sign jumped up in front of us. And reading it,
we were made to understand why there were no other automobiles on the
road except us. We understood, too, why Lawyer Chew had driven over
from his own town in a horse and buggy.
I made a copy of the crazy sign. Here it is:
NO AUTOMOBILES ALLOWED
Our streets are privately owned, so we have the legal right to
prohibit the use of automobiles within our corporation limits. Nor do
we permit dancing, the use of any intoxicating drinks, card playing,
the smoking or chewing of tobacco, or the playing of any musical
instrument except the harp. Our laws and ordinances will be strictly
enforced.
Noah }
Jonah }
Adam } Committee on Civil Affairs
Moses }
Goliath }