OUTWITTING A CRANK
"Old grouch," cried Mollie, shaking a vindictive little fist after the
departing farmer. "If it hadn't been that you would have killed yourself
too, Betty, I almost wish you had hit him."
"Well, I don't," said Grace ruefully. "Nobody ever thinks of poor me."
"I guess we had better be a little more careful in the future," said
Mrs. Ford, a worried line between her brows. "Better to be a little
longer reaching Bluff Point than to endanger our lives and perhaps the
lives of others."
"It almost looks as if we shouldn't have any choice," said Mollie, and
they looked at her in surprise.
"Well, we can't hope to pass that wagon," she explained, indicating the
vehicle that was now some hundred feet in front and was waddling along
at a snail's pace. "There isn't room, with the ditch on one side and the
drop on the other."
"It will be easy enough if he moves to one side of the road," suggested
Amy.
"He'll move over if we toot at him," added Grace.
But Mollie shook her head doubtfully.
"I'm not so sure," she said. "It would be just like him to try to get
even with us by blocking the road."
"Get even with us?" repeated Betty indignantly. "I might just as well
say I want to get even with him for being in the road when I wanted to
pass. How ridiculous."
"Of course it's ridiculous. That's probably the reason he would think of
it," insisted Mollie. "I know these farmers," she added, nodding darkly.
They laughed at her, and Betty cried gayly: "Well, we won't get anywhere
by standing here in the road. I move we follow the old fellow and see
what he's up to. And if he gets too ridiculous," she added, as she
climbed back into the car, "I know how I'll fix him."
"How?" they asked.
"I'll bump him," she responded ferociously, and amid more fun and
laughter they climbed back into the cars and started on again.
"You know, even his back looks stubborn," remarked Grace, when, coming
close to the wagon and tooting the horn vigorously, the driver refused
to budge from the middle of the road. "I guess perhaps you will have to
carry out your threat, Betty."
"Well, I declare if I won't," exclaimed the Little Captain, her cheeks
flushing and her eyes blazing at the stubborn insolence of the man. "It
would give me great pleasure to bump him clear down the side of the
mountain."
"It's getting late, too," worried Grace. "Can't you do something,
Betty?"
"Will you please suggest something?" cried Betty, exasperated. "There's
nothing in the rules for driving a machine that covers this difficulty.
I don't know what to do, unless-- Did you bring the pistol?"
Grace started.
"Goodness! you're not going to kill him are you?"
"Not unless I have to," replied Betty, and at her expression, Grace
laughed weakly.
"Yes, I brought the pistol," she said. "But it's down in the bottom of
the bag that is underneath all the other bags in the tonneau of Mollie's
car."
Betty groaned.
"And it isn't even loaded," added Grace, as an afterthought. "Mother
said it made her feel safer to have it along since there aren't going to
be any men with us, but she wouldn't have it loaded."
"What good is it then?" queried Betty.
"Just to scare people with."
"Well, that's what I want to do to that--man," cried Betty, trying to
think of something bad enough to call the cranky farmer, who still urged
his team along squarely in the middle of the road and refused to give an
inch. "Only I'd like to scare him to death. My conscience wouldn't even
hurt."
"It would be murder just the same," Grace suggested, with a little
hysterical laugh, "whether you shot him or scared him to death."
Betty was silent for a minute or two, crawling along behind the wagon
while her blood boiled and her anger surged. For Betty came from a race
of fighting ancestors who were not in the habit of submitting to
indignities.
"Grace, I've got to do something!" she burst out at last, gripping the
wheel so tightly her knuckles showed white. "It isn't so much the
valuable time we're losing, but it's an absolute necessity to show that
fellow where he--"
"'Where he gets off,'" Grace finished slangily. "I know dear, but how?"
Betty shook her head helplessly and just glared.
Then suddenly Grace uttered a little cry and sat up straight in her
seat.
"I have it!" she cried. "I know what we can do."
"Tell me," demanded Betty.
"Why, I know this road pretty well," Grace explained, speaking quickly.
"We're not much more than ten miles from Bluff Point."
"Yes, yes," cried Betty impatiently.
"Well, there is a short detour road that juts off from the main road
just a little further on, and after running parallel to the road for
half a mile or so, crosses it again."
"Yes," cried Betty again, beginning to understand the plot.
"So we'll take the detour," Grace finished triumphantly, "and come out,
in front of the farmer."
"And then--" said Betty with a chuckle and a gleam in her eye.
"The rest will be up to us," finished Grace. "Shall we know what to do
then?"
"I'll say we shall," chortled Betty, adding with a glance over her
shoulder at Mollie's car that was creeping along some twenty feet behind
them: "Of course the next thing will be to tell Mollie. Will you run
back Grace?"
For once Grace did not object, and without waiting for Betty to stop the
car, and indeed it was hardly necessary at the rate they were going,
jumped out and ran back, waving an excited hand at Mollie.
Betty heard a whoop of delight from the rear, and in a minute Grace was
back in her place.
"How far is it from here?" asked Betty, scanning the road ahead eagerly.
"I hope," she added, as a horrid fear assailed her, "that he doesn't
turn off on to the other road, too."
"Heavens, I hope not! Oh, there it is!" she cried a moment later, as a
turn in the winding road brought the crossroads to view. "Now, if he
only doesn't turn down it!"
Eagerly they watched and drew a sigh of relief as the driver jogged
steadily on down the main road.
"Now's our chance," exulted Betty, as she changed gears with a
challenging roar and slipped off merrily down the detour road.
Sullenly the driver watched them go and then with a shrug of his
shoulders, turned once more to his team.
Gayly the two cars sped along the road, bearing four Outdoor Girls bent
upon revenge. The going was rough and bumpy, far worse than the main
road, but the girls never noticed it.
"That was one time Grace had a good idea," Mollie was exulting as they
flew along. "I never thought she was particularly brilliant before, but
I have changed my mind." Then catching Mrs. Ford's eye, she added with a
little laugh: "You see that's the way Grace and I talk about each other.
Only," plaintively, "she says much worse things about me!"
"It will be fun," cried Amy, her eyes shining with anticipation, "to get
in front of him and give that old crank a taste of his own medicine."
"He certainly deserves it," agreed Mrs. Ford, for she was as indignant
as the girls at the man's insolence. "Didn't Grace say something about
pretending we were stalled?"
"She did," cried Mollie gleefully. "And as luck, I mean bad luck, will
have it, the mean old engine will choose the very center of the road to
do it's stalling in. Bless it's little old heart," and even Mrs. Ford
chuckled with her.
As Grace had said, the detour was not over half a mile long, and they
soon came out on the main road again. Then they backed the cars several
hundred feet down the road so as to effectually block all passage.
Betty tooted gleefully to Mollie, and Mollie tooted gleefully back
again. Then they jumped from the machines and met in the middle of the
road for a consultation.
"He will be coming in sight any minute now," Betty explained hurriedly,
"so we must decide on some definite plan of action."
"That's easy," said Mollie. "One of us will get down underneath the
machine and pretend to be tinkering--"
"Goodness, that lets me out," said Grace in dismay. "I wouldn't get down
in the dirt for fifty idiotic wagon drivers."
"Well, nobody's asking you to," cried Mollie impatiently. "I fully
intend to put on my overalls and do it myself."
"Better hurry up," cried Amy, who had been glancing uneasily down the
road. "He may come along any minute now and we don't want him to catch
us here."
So amid much hilarity and giggling Mollie got into the begrimed overalls
and proceeded to wriggle her small self beneath the car.
"I hope he hurries," she cried in a muffled voice. "It isn't exactly
what you might call comfortable down here. Betty, get off my foot," as
Grace wickedly stepped on her toes.
"Just hear her," cried Betty plaintively. "Everything just naturally
gets blamed on me."
"Well, if you didn't, who did?" queried Mollie fiercely. "Tell me her
name--"
"Betty, Betty, don't give me away," pleaded Grace, at which the girls
laughed while a satisfied chuckle came from under the car.
"I knew I'd find the guilty one," Mollie was beginning when Betty cut
her short with a warning cry.
"He's coming," she said, adding, as she vainly tried to straighten the
corners of her mischievous mouth: "And please remember, girls, this is a
very solemn occasion!"