A WILD RIDE
Although Tom and Mr. Connors walked as fast as they knew how, the
garage was lighted when they came in sight of it and they found
Willard, who had run all the way from his house, seeing to the lamps on
the car.
“I’ve looked at the tank, Tom, and it’s two-thirds full,” said Willard.
“That’ll get us to Finley Falls all right. We can buy gas there if we
need more. Shall I turn the lights on?”
Mr. Connors, after nodding to Willard, took out his watch and frowned
at what he saw. While the boys lighted the lamps he paced impatiently
up and down by the car, although Tom had opened the tonneau door
invitingly. Finally, “All ready, sir,” said Tom. Mr. Connors took his
place in the back of the car, Willard slammed the door after him and
The Ark ran out into the street. Willard closed the garage and sprang
into his place beside Tom. The engine sputtered, the gears rasped and
they started off. One block on Main Street and Tom turned back through
Linden to Washington. As he swung around the corner he pulled the
throttle further open and they flew along under the yellowing elms at
a pace that brought the residents of that quiet thoroughfare to their
doors.
As they passed the common a quick glance at the clock in the Town Hall
gave them the time. It was just eight minutes to seven.
“You’ll be cold,” said Tom, as he noted that Willard had no overcoat on.
“No, I won’t; not very. There wasn’t time to find anything.” Willard
dropped his voice. “How badly is he hurt, Tom?”
“I don’t know. The telegram didn’t say. It just said ‘seriously
injured.’ He’s in the hospital, though, and I guess it’s pretty bad.”
Their way took them down River Street, past the station, over the
bridge and then sharply to the right along a country road that followed
the river for five or six miles. It was a fair road, when in good
condition, but lack of rain for many days had placed a two-inch deposit
of dust on it and hollowed out many chuck-holes. But this was no time
to consider comfort, and, once in the Fountain Road, Tom pulled the
throttle wide open, and, with the searchlights boring a dim yellow path
into the gloom of early evening, The Ark bounced and lurched onward at
break-neck speed.
“What do you suppose we’re making?” gasped Willard once, above the hum
of the engine and the spatter of the exhaust. He was holding on to the
arm of the seat to keep from bumping against his companion.
“Thirty, anyway; thirty-five, I hope,” answered Tom, clinging to the
wheel. “It’s the best she can do, whatever it is,” he added grimly.
“We turn pretty soon, don’t we?”
“Yes, at the three corners. I’m watching for it. There it is now. Hold
hard!”
The car lurched wildly to the left, scraping the bushes beside the
way, and straightened out again in the middle of the road. “It’s plain
sailing now to Potterstown,” said Tom. “We’ll have to ask when we get
there. What’s he doing?”
Willard stole a look at the passenger. “Nothing,” he answered. “Just
sitting there. I guess he’s feeling pretty bad.”
A mile further on Willard gave voice to the fear that had been nagging
him all along. “Say, Tom, suppose we met a wagon or something. What
would happen? There isn’t room to pass, is there?”
“I don’t know,” answered the other calmly. “Hope so.”
He didn’t slow down his speed, however, and Willard, smothering a sigh,
leaned back again. The road wound through fields and woods, with here
and there, at long intervals, a farm-house showing a dim light from a
window or two. Fortunately there were no steep grades, although they
had been gradually ascending ever since leaving the river. But the
road was scarcely wide enough for two teams to pass save with caution
and Willard’s uneasiness was excusable. Luck, however, was with them
mile after mile. In the rear seat Mr. Connors, braced in a corner,
was bounced and shaken as the car swayed and bounded along with every
spring and bolt complaining. They were almost at Potterstown when
Willard gave a cry of warning. Into the field of light ahead, where
the narrow road turned to the right about the foot of a hill pasture,
suddenly came a vehicle.
Willard’s cry was drowned in the hoarse barking of the horn. There
was no time to stop, and Willard, clinging frantically to the seat,
closed his eyes. There was a shout of alarm beside him, the car tipped
perilously, there was a tremendous jolt and the sound of splintering
wood, and then――the steady whirr and hum of the car once more. Willard
opened his eyes. Ahead of them the road stretched straight and empty.
“Did we hit them?” he gasped.
“No, struck a rail fence,” came the untroubled answer. “Missed the
wagon by nearly a foot, I guess. There’s Potterstown ahead.”
Willard’s nervous bracing of his feet on the floor ceased as the car
lessened its speed to run into the little village, and he uttered a
sigh of relief. Tom heard it, perhaps, for he chuckled as he threw
out his clutch in front of the little hotel in the square and put his
brakes on hard.
“Which way to Finley Falls?” he called to a group on the porch.
“Straight on for a half a mile and then turn left at the old school
house. You can’t miss that. Keep on till you come to a big barn about
four miles along. Take the right hand road there and you’ll fetch the
Falls.”
“How far is it?” asked Tom.
“’Bout twenty-four miles, I guess; maybe a little more.”
“Thank you.” Tom turned to Willard. “What time is it now?”
Willard held the face of his watch to the dim light that came from the
open door of the hotel. “Twenty-eight minutes to eight,” he answered.
The car started again, the exhaust popping loudly, the gears rasped as
Tom pulled the lever and The Ark took up her journey once more. Tom ran
cautiously through the little village which strung itself out along
the straight road. Suddenly a hoarse and anxious voice sounded at his
ear.
“What time is it now?” asked Mr. Connors.
“Twenty-eight to eight, sir.”
“How far have we come?”
“About twenty-six miles, I think. I can’t say exactly because I don’t
know just how far it is to the Falls.”
“When will we get there?”
“We ought to be there in another hour, sir.”
“An hour more!” exclaimed Mr. Connors with a groan. “Can’t you go any
faster, Benton. I haven’t said anything about paying you for this, but
it’s fifty dollars, a hundred, if you get me there before――” his voice
broke――“before it’s too late!”
“I’ll do the best I can, Mr. Connors. I’ve run the car at her limit
most of the way and I’ll hit it up again as soon as we find the next
turn. And I guess that’s it ahead there now.”
He was right. A small, hip-roofed building, set in an apex between
diverging roads, with a flag-pole in front of it, was plainly the
schoolhouse. The Ark swung to the left and Tom’s fingers sought the
throttle lever. The Ark’s purr became a hoarse roar. Faster and faster
the car plunged through the darkness. It was cold now with the damp
chill of an autumn night, and Willard, his jacket buttoned tight to
his throat and the collar turned up, shivered as they flew down a long
hill, the air rushing past them like the blast from a giant fan. Tom
slowed up at the foot of the hill and half arose in his seat.
“Help me off with this coat,” he said as he worked one arm out.
“What for?” asked Willard, obeying while he questioned.
“It’s in the way. It’s too warm. That’s it. Steady! Now put it on.”
“But――――” began Willard.
“Hurry up!” commanded Tom impatiently. “You’re losing time!”
Willard, protesting, struggled into it, the car leaped forward again
and Willard staggered back into his seat.
“You’ll catch cold, Tom,” he said aggrievedly. “You’d no business doing
that.”
“Shut up. I’m all right. Running this thing keeps you warm enough. How
far did he say that barn was from the schoolhouse?”
“Four miles.”
They found it soon, a big white object that loomed ahead of them
through the blackness.
“Right,” reminded Willard. Tom nodded and the car swung around the
corner on two wheels and raced at a hill.
“About nineteen more, I guess,” said Tom, as they topped the summit and
dropped down the other side. “What are those lights ahead?”
“Maybe a wagon. Better go easy.”
“There isn’t time,” answered Tom, peering ahead. The lights came
flashing up to them, there was a jolt, and The Ark swept past a
crossing-tender’s shanty and over the railroad tracks.
“Gee, it’s lucky there wasn’t a train coming!” exclaimed Willard
thankfully.
“We’d seen the head-light,” Tom answered. “This road’s getting better,
isn’t it? Either that or I’m getting used to being shaken up. How much
gas do you think we had when we left?”
“About six or seven gallons. The tank was two-thirds full.”
“We won’t use more than four, I suppose. How about oil?”
“I didn’t look. The crank-case was filled Wednesday, though.”
“I guess there’s enough. We’ll soon know it if there isn’t.”
“What will happen?”
“She’ll heat up and smell like the dickens first.”
“Then what?”
“Stop, I guess. But we’ll be there by that time. She’s running like a
charm now, isn’t she?”
“I guess she never went as fast before,” replied Willard. “And I don’t
think I want to be in her when she does it again!”
“Do you suppose we can find a place to sleep when we get there? And a
place to put the car in?”
“Sure! There’s a big hotel there. And I guess they’ve got a stable, or
maybe, a garage. I wish we were there now. I’ll bet I’ll go to sleep
to-night without being sung to!”
“And I’ll bet I’ll be running this old car all night long in my
dreams,” answered Tom with a sigh. “My arm is as stiff as a poker right
now and has funny little pains in it.”
“Couldn’t I take the wheel a while? I guess I wouldn’t be any more
scared to run the car than I am sitting here watching for trouble!”
“I’ll stick it out,” answered Tom grimly. “There can’t be much further
to go.”
After that silence reigned for several miles. Occasionally a dim
reddish glow from the back of the car told them that Mr. Connors was
fighting nervousness with cigars. On and on, mile after mile, sped The
Ark, never once faltering in its task. Willard’s eyes became heavy,
and once, forgetting his anxiety, he actually slumbered for a moment
between jounces! Then Tom’s voice startled him into full wakefulness.
“Finley Falls,” said Tom briefly.
Ahead of them the sky glowed as from the many lights of a city.
The road began to show small houses on each side, the homes of
truck-farmers. Then a factory loomed dark and formless at the left, and
they crossed a stream that fell over a dam and drowned for an instant
the noise of the car. And then, almost before they realized it, they
were in the outskirts of the town and The Ark was running smoothly in
the rails of a trolley road. Lights flashed from houses that clustered
closer and closer together. Vehicles began to dispute the crossings
with them and Tom was forced to slow down. Then cobblestones took the
place of dirt under the wheels, stores appeared, flooding the street
with light, and The Ark was at the end of its journey.
And yet not quite, for when Tom stopped in front of a brilliant
drug-store and Willard leaped out to make inquiries they found that
they must traverse the center of town before they could reach the
hospital. That was slow work, for it was a Saturday night and Finley
Falls was a busy place, and more than once Tom had to stop at crossings
or crawl along for rods at a time behind slow-moving trolley cars and
teams. But once through the shopping district Tom sped faster again and
a few minutes later The Ark was brought to a final halt in front of a
big building with many lighted windows and a wide doorway at the top
of a flight of granite steps. Mr. Connors was out almost before the car
stopped and was hurrying toward the entrance. But half-way up the steps
the boys saw him stop. He stood quite motionless for a moment. Then he
went on slowly and was lost to sight within the building.
Tom sighed. “I hope we got him here in time,” he said softly.
“So do I,” agreed Willard as he climbed stiffly out and stretched his
legs. “I wonder how long it took us, Tom.”
“What time is it now?”
“Just twenty-four minutes past eight.”
“We left at six-fifty-two. That makes it an hour and――and thirty-two
minutes. If it’s about fifty-two miles that’s pretty good time!
Especially as we had to crawl through the city when we got here!”
“We must have averaged pretty nearly thirty-five miles an hour!”
exclaimed Willard. “Gee, I didn’t think the old Ark could do it!”
“She did though. And she sounds like it. Hear that water boiling in the
radiator, will you?”
Tom, who had not left his seat since the start, pulled himself erect
with many groans and descended to the sidewalk, rubbing his arms to get
the kinks out. “I suppose,” he said, “we’re to wait here until he sends
word or something.”
At that moment a figure descended the steps and approached the car.
“That you, Tom Benton?” asked a voice.
“Yes, sir. Is that you, Mr. Chase?”
The Assistant Principal clapped a hand on Tom’s shoulder and seized his
hand in a tight clasp. “Tom, you saved the day, I guess,” he said.
“You mean――I got him here――in time, sir?”
“Yes. George had a pretty hard knock. I don’t know just how it
happened. It was about five minutes before the end of the last quarter,
and there was a pile-up in front of their goal. Perhaps he was kicked.
Anyhow, he was senseless when we got him off. We rushed him right
up here in a carriage and the doctors said it was concussion of the
brain. They put him to bed and examined him and said there’d have to
be an operation as the skull was fractured a little; trepanning, they
call it. But they wouldn’t operate without permission of his folks. I
sent another telegram then, but Mr. Connors’ wire, saying he had left,
reached me a few minutes later. There was nothing to do then but wait.
Half an hour ago the surgeon told me that if they didn’t operate inside
an hour it might be too late. There was a pressure on the brain, it
seems. They’re doing it now. There’s not much danger now, they say, but
of course the poor boy will be laid up for some time. It was lucky Mr.
Connors thought of getting you to bring him, Tom. If he had waited for
the train he wouldn’t have got here until after ten. You must have made
time, boys!”
“We did,” replied Willard with emphasis.
“I must get back,” said Mr. Chase. “As soon as the operation’s over
I’ll let you know. Then you’d better get back to the Mosely House;
that’s where I’m staying; and turn in. Of course, you aren’t thinking
of going back to-night?”
“No, sir, I guess about all we’re thinking about is bed,” said Tom. “If
you’ll let us know when he’s out of danger we’ll go along, sir. I’m
awfully glad it’s no worse than it is. Your telegram sounded pretty
bad, sir.”
“Things looked pretty bad when I sent it,” replied the teacher. “Well,
I’ll be back in a half-hour, I guess. You boys ought to be proud of
what you’ve done to-night!”
“I don’t know that I’m so proud of what _we’ve_ done,” said Tom as Mr.
Chase hurried back into the hospital, “but I’m certainly proud of what
the old Ark has done!”
And he patted the wheel affectionately.