PLANS.
"When I got over the point, pards," said Joe, dropping into a chair and
fanning himself with his hat, "the _Wyandotte_ was just comin' down
the lake to pull off her usual race with herself. I hauled up in the
road, with the bushes between me and the water, ready to jump into the
saddle the minute the boat came opposite. I was keeping shady, you can
bet your moccasins on that, and it was some sort of a jolt when I saw
a galoot perched on a stone. He looked like a hobo, and the way he
grinned got on my nerves.
"'I'm funny, all right,' I says to him, 'but where I come from a feller
gets shot if he looks that way at some one else.'
"'I ain't laffin' at you,' says the tramp, 'but at the joke them other
mugs is playin' on you an' your push.'
"'Where does the joke come in?' I inquires.
"'Why,' he comes back, 'that other club is foolin' you with a boat
here on Fourth Lake when the real boat is over on Third. If what I'm
a-sayin' is worth a dollar to you, just remember and cough up.'
"Well, say, that hobo wasn't a holy minute grabbin' my attention. I
fell off the chug wheel right there and proceeded to palaver. It turned
out that Merton's gard'ner was sick for a few days, and that the tramp
mowed the lawn and did a few other things around the place. There was
an open window, Ollie and some of his pards were on the other side
of it, and the noise of the lawnmower didn't prevent the tramp from
hearing what was said. You can bet your last dollar it was hot news he
got hold of.
"Merton and the Winnequas were plannin' to fool us with the _Wyandotte_
on Fourth Lake while they were warming up the real boat on Third. The
hobo said I could wait there at the Point till the _Wyandotte_ came
closer, and that I'd see Merton wasn't aboard; then he allowed that if
I'd sizzle over to the gun club on Third Lake I'd see the real prize
winner doing stunts that would curl my hair.
"The tramp was off for Waunakee, and had just dropped down on a stone
to rest. My coming along was a happenchance, as he hadn't intended to
peddle the news he'd got hold of, but he recognized me as being a pard
of Motor Matt's, and a dollar looked pretty big to him.
"I waited till the _Wyandotte_ was close, and then I saw that Merton
wasn't aboard. Would I swallow the hobo's yarn or not? I decided that I
would, so I threw him a dollar and burned the air in the direction of
the gun club and Third Lake.
"Well, t'other boat was there, sliding around like a streak of greased
lightning. Half the time I couldn't see her for the foam she kicked up.
I managed to pick up the label on her bow as she was making a turn,
and it's the _Dart_. But go--speak to me about that! Say, she gets
to a place pretty near before she starts. Merton was aboard, and so
was that red-headed pard of his, Halloran. Halloran was working the
machinery. I watched my chance and kept abreast of the _Dart_ for a
mile. Twenty-one miles is what the speedometer registered, although the
count may be shy a little one way or the other. I was too excited to
be entirely accurate. Our hands are in the air, pards, and no mistake.
The _Sprite_'ll look like a turtle wallowin' along in the wake of a
swordfish."
Matt and Lorry had listened to this recital with varying feelings. Matt
was deeply interested, but Lorry was visibly cast down.
"How big is the _Dart_, Joe?" inquired Matt.
"Twenty-five or thirty feet, Matt."
"You must be a little wrong in your estimate of the _Dart's_ speed. It
doesn't seem possible that she could turn a mile in less than three
minutes."
"Well, look!" exclaimed McGlory, catching his first glimpse of Ping.
"If there ain't little Washee-washee Slant-eyes I'm a Chink myself.
When and how did he flash out in these parts?"
Matt, by way of relieving the tension aroused by McGlory's exciting
news, told of the scuffle in the path leading up the bank, and then
allowed the Celestial to finish with an account of the way he had come
from Frisco.
"Let's get back to the boats," put in Lorry impatiently, when Ping had
got through with his pidgin English. "Hadn't I better withdraw the
_Sprite_, Matt, and let some other fellow meet Merton?"
Matt stared.
"I didn't believe you were that sort of a fellow, Lorry," he returned,
"and I don't think so yet."
"But if the _Sprite_ hasn't any chance----"
"She has a chance, and a good one, after I get her ready. There'll have
to be more extensive changes, that's all."
"What other changes are you thinking about?"
"Ping," said Matt, turning to the Chinese, "you go outside the
boathouse and see that no one hangs around it while we're talking."
"Can do," chirped Ping, and shuffled out.
Matt pulled up a chair close to Lorry's and motioned for McGlory to
join the inner circle. Then Matt explained about the loss of the roll
of drawings.
The cowboy was mad clear through in half a second.
"It was Merton, all right," he scowled, "and you can bet a ten-dollar
note against a last year's bird's nest on that. By this time he'll know
what the improved _Sprite_ can do, and he'll also know that the _Dart_
can run circles around her. We're Jonahed, for fair."
"No, we're not," said Matt. "As long as I thought we had only the
_Wyandotte_ to beat, I was only planning to make the _Sprite_ fast
enough for that purpose. But I can make the _Sprite_ the fastest thing
on the lakes--it'll take a hustle, though, and I'll have to have a
machinist helper."
"I don't care how many men you have to have, Matt, nor how many extra
supplies," returned Lorry, beginning to gather a little confidence from
the quiet, determined air of the king of the motor boys. "Go ahead, and
call on me for what money you need."
"Over at the machine shop, where I've been getting some work done,"
proceeded Matt, "they have a double-opposed, four-cycle automobile
engine, capable of developing from eighteen to twenty horse-power at
eighteen hundred revolutions per minute. The cylinders are five by
five. That's a pretty stiff engine for the _Sprite_, but the hull
could be strengthened, and we could put it in and get about ninety or
ninety-five per cent. of the horse-power by gearing down three to one.
After the gears wear a little, the percentage of horse-power might drop
to eighty. This motor will drive a three-bladed propeller twenty-six
inches diameter, thirty-two inches pitch. If the vibration don't shake
me out of the boat at eighteen hundred revolutions per minute, the
speed we'll get will be astonishing."
"Whoop!" exulted McGlory. "I don't know what it all means, but it
listens good. I reckon there's a kick or two in the old _Sprite_ yet."
"You can't run a boat engine like you run an automobile motor, Matt,"
said Lorry.
"Of course not. A steady load and steady plugging in the water is a
whole lot different from the give-and-take a motor gets in an auto;
but we can keep up the eighteen hundred revolutions for ten minutes,
anyhow--and the race only covers five miles. I'm fixing the _Sprite_
to win the race, that's all."
"By George!" exclaimed Lorry, "it takes you to make a fellow feel good,
Matt! You know what you're doing, every time and all the time. Go ahead
with the work, and bank on me to hold you up with both hands."
"Me, too, pard!" added McGlory.
"What we're doing," said Matt, "we want to keep strictly to ourselves.
Merton has our drawings, and probably thinks he knows just what we're
about. Let him think so. If he springs a 'dark horse' on us, we'll get
even by springing one on him."
"But can you get the _Sprite_ ready in time?" asked Lorry anxiously.
"Sure I can! I'll have to begin at once, though, and some of us will
have to stay in this boathouse night and day to make sure that none of
the Winnequas come prowling around. If you'll stay here with McGlory,
George, I'll borrow your motor cycle to go over to the machine shop and
dicker for that second-hand engine."
"Go on," said Lorry. "While you're there you might get a man to help
you."
Matt got up and pulled the motor cycle away from the bench.
"I'll be back in an hour, fellows," said he.
Leaving the boathouse, he dragged the wheel to the top of the steep
bank, then, getting into the saddle, he gave the pedals a turn and was
off like a shot along the wooded road that led past the insane asylum
and by the Waunakee Road and Sherman Avenue into town.
If Motor Matt loved one thing more than another, it was a good, clean
fight for supremacy, such as the one that now confronted him and his
friends. There was a zest in such a struggle, and the pleasure of
winning out against odds, in a good cause, was its own reward.
As he whizzed along the wooded road, mechanically steering the wheel
while his mind busied itself with other things, he was confronted
suddenly by a rail held breast-high across his course. It was
impossible to turn out at that point, and Matt had to shut off the
power and jam down hard on the brake.
He caught a glimpse of a silent form at each end of the rail, and then,
as he halted, of half a dozen other forms rushing out at him from the
bushes on each side of the road.
In another moment he was caught and dragged from the motor cycle.