FLIGHT
"Wink!" he cried. "Ossie! Come quick! Help here!"
The robber, having uttered a stifled cry of alarm at the instant of the
unexpected attack, was now thrashing mightily about on the thick rug.
"Help!" he shouted. "Who are you? Let me go!"
"S-sh!" commanded Perry sternly, as the others plunged to his aid,
overturning a chair on the way. "Be quiet! Sit on his legs, Ossie!"
Perry was astride the man's chest, holding his arms to the floor. "Punch
him if he makes a noise, Wink!" Perry, breathing hard, surveyed his
captive in triumph. "Now then," he asked, "what have you got to say for
yourself? What were you doing at that safe?"
The man glared in silence for an instant. To Wink it seemed that the
emotion exhibited on the robber's countenance was amazement rather than
fear.
"Come on," urged Perry. "What's the game?"
"Game!" choked the man, finding his voice at last. "Game? You--you young
ruffians! You--"
"Cut that out, or I'll hand you something," growled Wink. "Answer
politely."
"Let me up!"
"Nothing doing!" answered Perry. "Come across. What's your name and
where do you come from? As you didn't get anything out of there, maybe
we'll be easy with you if you talk quick."
"Let me suggest, if I may," said the man in a strangely quiet and
restrained tone, "that you get off my stomach. This conversation can
just as well be conducted under more comfortable conditions."
Perry blinked and Wink viewed the captive doubtfully.
"Promise not to try to run?" demanded Perry.
"I have no intention of running, thanks." The robber carefully dusted
his clothes as he arose and then felt anxiously of a bruised elbow.
"Now, if you will inform me what this--this murderous assault means I
shall be greatly obliged to you."
"Suppose you tell us what you were doing at that safe?" said Perry
sternly.
"Is that any of your business?" asked the other. It was evident that he
was losing his temper again, and Wink drew a step nearer. "I presume I
have a perfect right to open my own safe! What I wish to know--"
"Your own safe!" gasped Perry. "Oh, come now, you needn't try to tell us
that you--you live here. You're a cracksman, my friend, that's what you
are--"
Ossie tugged at Perry's sleeve, but Perry failed to notice it.
"One look at that face of yours is enough, old top," continued Perry.
"It's got crook written all over it!"
"It has, has it?" gasped the man. "Let me tell you that my name is
Drummond, sir, and that this is my house, and that is my safe, and--and
if you'll mind your own business--"
"What!" asked Perry weakly. "You mean that you--that this--you mean
that--"
"I mean," interrupted the man angrily, "that I was about to deposit some
money in that safe, some money I'd been carrying around in my pocket all
the evening and feared I might lose, when you--you young thugs set on me
and knocked me down! Knocked me down right in my own house, on my own
hearth-rug! Why, you--you--"
Mr. Drummond's wrath got the better of his speech and he only sputtered,
waving an accusing finger at the retreating Perry. Wink was already
glancing about for a means of escape and Ossie was frankly deserting.
"I--I didn't know!" gasped Perry. "I--we saw you come in--and you looked
like--like a--"
"You've said that already!" said the man, "Never mind my criminal looks,
young man!"
"No, sir, we don't--I mean I was mistaken, sir! But, you see, it looked
so--so queer, you coming in like that--"
"Queer! What was queer about it!" demanded Mr. Drummond irascibly, "No
one but a parcel of young idiots would think it queer!" He took an
envelope from his pocket, tossed it into the safe, closed door and panel
and faced them again. "Who are you, anyway? I don't remember you."
"Er--my name--my name--" stammered Perry, "my name--"
"Well, well! Don't you know your name? Who invited you here?"
"Yes, sir, oh, yes, sir! It's Bush. We--you see, we were on the porch
there, and we wanted to get back to the--the front of the house--"
"Who invited you here, tonight? Who--" The host's expression changed
from indignation to suspicion. "Huh!" he ejaculated. "Robber, eh! Well,
what were you doing in this room? Seems to me--hm! We'll look into this,
I think!" He stepped back and touched a button in the wall. "We'll have
this explained! We'll see who the robber is! We--"
"_Good night!_" Perry spurned the table against which he was leaning,
hurdled a chair and plunged down the room. Ossie was at his heels and
Wink was a good third. They fled at top speed and from behind them came
the irate commands of their host:
"Stop! Come back! Stop, I say!"
But they didn't stop. They only ran faster. Wink beat Ossie to the first
window easily and passed out even with Perry. And as they landed on the
stone flagging outside they heard Mr. Drummond excitedly directing the
pursuit.
"Quick, Wilkins! Get them! They tried to rob the house!" Mr. Drummond's
voice pursued them along the verandah. "Help! Robbers! Head them off!"
The boys took the stone steps in two bounds, crashed at the bottom into
a hedge, went tearing through and emerged beyond in a service yard,
dimly lighted by one struggling electric bulb over a back doorway. It
was Ossie who fell into the clothes basket and Wink who collided with
the clothes reel and sent it spinning wildly and creakingly around in
the darkness. Perry fortunately avoided all pitfalls and was leading by
six yards when he reached the top of another flight of steps and saw the
marquee and the dancing platform and the gay lights at his right. To
make their way in that direction would be sheer folly, while in front of
them lay a tangle of shrubbery and trees. Into this they hurtled, as
from behind them came cries of "Stop, thief!" and the crunching of many
footsteps.
Off went Wink's hat as he fled after the scurrying Perry. Ossie went
down in a tangle of briars and prickly things with a grunt, rolled
somehow clear and was off again. "This way!" shouted a voice. "I seen
'em! They went in here! Come on, men!"
Perry was running alongside a wall now, as he hoped, in the general
direction of the street. Behind him came Wink and Ossie, crashing
through shrubbery with a desperate disregard for noise. Then suddenly,
the wall turned abruptly to the right. Perry stopped short, looked and
decided.
"We've got to get over!" he gasped, as Wink ran blindly into him. "Give
me a leg-up!"
Wink leaned weakly against the wall and Perry set a foot on his cupped
hands and was just able to reach the top of the wall. But that was
enough. Up he climbed. Then up came Ossie, and together, while the
pursuit drew instantly closer, they pulled Wink to safety. For a brief
moment they sat there and caught their breath while wondering what lay
below them in the gloom of the further side. But there was scant time
for conjectures, for the pursuit was in sight. Three bodies launched
themselves into space, there was a frightful, devastating sound of
breaking glass and the boys disengaged themselves from a cold-frame and
sped on again into the darkness.
A house loomed suddenly before them, a house with lights and folks about
the porch and a panting automobile curving its way down a drive. They
turned to the right and kept along a lawn in the shadows of the trees.
The automobile passed them with a purr and a sweeping flare of white
light. Then Perry was after it and in another moment they were all
three huddled somehow on the gas-tank at the rear and going with
increasing speed out of the grounds and along a road. For a few minutes
they hung there, breathing hard, and then Wink gasped:
"We've got to get off, Perry! It's going the wrong way!"
"If we do, we'll get killed," answered Perry. "Wait till it slows up."
They waited, but it seemed that it never would slow up. It went faster
and faster. It passed houses and stores and a church. It went like the
wind. Ossie groaned as they left the village behind.
"I can't stay on much longer, fellows!" he said hopelessly. "I'm
clinging by my t-t-teeth!"
"You've got to!" answered Perry above the noise of the exhaust. "You'll
break something if you don't! Wait till it slows up!"
_Toot! Toot! To-o-oot!_ said the horn. And then, so suddenly that
Perry's head collided with something particularly hard, the brakes
squeaked harshly, the car slewed into an avenue and the boys, making the
most of the opportunity, fell off. Ossie rolled a full half-dozen yards
before his progress was stayed by a tree, and Wink, or so Perry
declared afterwards, described a beautiful and quite perfect circle.
Bruised, breathless and dizzy, they got to their feet and staggered to
the side of the road and subsided on the turf.
After a long minute Ossie said feebly: "Where--do you--suppose--we are?"
"About ten miles--in the country," answered Wink.
There was silence then, silence long and profound. At last they climbed
to their feet and, without speaking, walked off in the darkness in the
direction from which they had come. Perhaps ten minutes later there came
the first sound to break the silence. It was a choking sort of gurgle
from Wink.
"What's the matter with you?" inquired Perry listlessly.
"I was just--just thinking," replied Wink. "It was so--so--" But words
failed him and he began to laugh. After a dubious instant Perry
chuckled, and then Ossie, and presently they were clinging to each other
convulsively in the middle of the unknown road and sending shrieks of
laughter up to the starlit sky.
Over an hour later they reached the landing. Both tenders were gone. The
_Follow Me_ was dark, but a faint light still burned aboard the
_Adventurer_. Perry cupped his hands and sent a hail across the water. A
sleepy response was followed by the sound of someone tumbling into the
dingey and then by the measured creak of oars. Han was grumbling as he
drew to the float.
"A fine time to be coming back," he said. "Where the dickens did you
fellows get to, anyway? We looked all around the shop for you. Did you
get any grub?"
"N-no," answered Perry, as he sank wearily into a seat. "We got tired of
sticking around there and--and went for a ride."
"A ride? Where to?"
"Oh, just around a bit. Out in the country a ways. Was--was the grub any
good?"
"Was it!" Han grew quite animated. "It was the best ever! They had about
a dozen kinds of salad, and cold meats all over the place, and
sandwiches and cakes and ice-cream and ices and coffee and--"
"Oh, shut up!" begged Ossie almost tearfully.
"It was bully! Were you there when we chased the burglars?"
"When you--what?" asked Wink.
"Chased the burglars, I said. Mr. Drummer, or something--I never did
get the name of the folks--found three of them trying to break into his
safe, and they knocked him down and half-killed him, and the servants
chased them, and then everyone took a hand! It was fine and exciting, I
tell you! Had you gone off before that?"
"Why--er--seems to me we did hear something," said Perry. "When--when
was this?"
"Oh, about a quarter to ten, I suppose. We were dancing--"
"_You_ were dancing?" ejaculated Wink.
"Sure! All of us danced. Didn't you?"
"Who with, for the love of Mike?"
"Oh, lots of girls. Mrs. Thingamabob happened to find Joe standing
around and made him tell her his name, and then she took him off and
introduced him to some girls, and then he introduced the rest of us. It
was a peachy floor. Some of the girls were all right, too."
"You seem to have got on fairly well," said Wink, "considering you
weren't invited."
"We were invited just as much as you were," responded Han indignantly.
"Maybe, son, maybe," answered Wink, as he climbed aboard the darkened
_Follow Me_, "but I'll bet they weren't half as sorry to see you go as
they were to see us!"
With which cryptic remark Wink stumbled into the cockpit and
disappeared.