A SWIFT RIDE THROUGH THE DARKNESS
With what glorious good feeling Paul and Billy sat down to their late
dinner at the American House! Paul was a little ashamed of the slighting
remarks he had lately made about the hotel fare. He said as much.
"Gee! I should think you would be, to see you diving into it all right
now!" Billy laughed. Ah, what a difference in _his_ spirits, also, the
recovery of the car had made!
It seems strange to me that, considering the imperative nature of the
telegram from Phil and Dave, Worth and Jones were not more deeply
impressed by it. No doubt the finding of their own car had made them
quite indifferent to all else. At any rate, they hardly more than
mentioned the message from Syracuse, when they met Mr. Creek at his
garage in the afternoon. Thither they had gone, eager to give the Six
such a gentle but thorough washing and oiling, and the brass such a
complete polishing, as they felt no one else to be capable of doing.
The work progressed most favorably. By supper time the beloved machine
stood dry, clean and shining. A truly beautiful car, it never looked
more lovely to Paul and to Billy than at this moment, with the sinking
sun lighting up its radiance through the big front window of Creek's
garage. The Torpedo, though a first-class car, appeared dingy and
commonplace beside it.
After bathing and dressing in clean, dry clothes, following their
labors, the two boys were passing through the hotel office toward the
dining-room. Mr. Wagg stopped them.
"'Nother telegram," said he, peering over his glasses, as usual. "You
two are getting to be about the most important citizens of this
village."
Eagerly the yellow envelope was opened. "Yours received. Hurrah. Meet us
with car eleven o'clock train. Phil."
"Hully gee! I'll bet _they're_ glad!" chirped Paul. But had he known all
that Dave and Phil now knew, he would have been even more elated and
excited than he was.
After supper the boys stepped around to the garage. Willie Creek had
just left in his own car for Port Greeley, said his boy of all work,
half asleep on the cot in the office. "Somebody telephoned him he could
sell a car, if he could get over there and give a demonstration right
off," the lad explained. "He won't be home till toward mornin', maybe."
"We were only going for a ride, anyway," said Billy.
The facts were that he and Paul had decided to drive out to see Alfred
Earnest and his friend Hipp. They believed they could tell from the
manner of these young gentlemen whether they had not known all along
where the Six was hidden.
"For an entire stranger would never have found those planks _away over
beyond that hill_," declared Worth with confident emphasis.
If Earnest or Hipp had had any knowledge of the stealing of the Auto
Boys' car, however, they concealed the fact amazingly well. They
appeared most hearty in their congratulations upon the machine's
recovery, as Billy and Paul told the story to them and to Rev. and Mrs.
Earnest at the latter's home. Later the cordial young minister and his
wife were taken for a ten-mile spin. Then Mrs. Earnest insisted that all
the boys come in for a little lunch. Worth and Jones had abundant time
at their disposal as they must remain up to meet Phil and Dave, and
cordially accepted the invitation. It was just after ten o'clock when
they at last drove back to Griffin and to the American House, there to
wait until train time.
"Hello, here! Fobes has been looking for you boys high and low!" said
Mr. Wagg, severely, hastening out to meet them. "That man he has had in
the lockup has escaped. Sawed the bars of a cell and went out through a
corridor window. It is bad luck, I'm afraid. Fobes says the man made an
offer to tell you where your car was if you'd pass some saws in to him."
"But I never _did_ it!" cried Billy Worth, indignantly. Quickly he had
seen the likelihood that suspicion might point toward him in the
remarkable coincidence that, directly the stolen car was found, Coster
had been enabled to break jail.
The hotel telephone rang long and loudly. The very tone of haste and
impatience was in its harsh clang and clamor.
"Well!" shouted Mr. Wagg, answering, and his voice was neither soft nor
pleasant. Then in milder tones, "You're wanted, Worth."
Billy stepped to the phone. "No, certainly not," Paul heard him say. And
then, "It can't be!" A pause, then further, "Oh, that's awful! We'll be
over there right off!"
With frightened, staring eyes Worth turned to Paul. "The Torpedo is
gone," he said.
Grievous anxiety and alarm filled the hearts of the two boys. Quickly
they drove the Six to Creek's garage. Chief Fobes and the youth who
assisted in the establishment both ran out as the car stopped at the
door.
It had been long since anyone had seen Mr. Fobes so wide awake, and so
keen to do his duty as he was now. He was frightened, too, lest his
prisoner's escape might cost him his position. And he was so perplexed
and so confused by his excitement that, as he mentioned suspiciously the
circumstance that Coster "got his saws and you fellows got your car,"
Worth really feared the officer would be for clapping him into jail
immediately.
The Torpedo was as completely missing as if it had never been. Creek's
boy had not the shadow of an idea concerning the machine. He knew only
that he fell asleep in the office and was awakened by someone who wanted
gasoline. Not until this customer was gone did he discover the absence
of the Torpedo. He at once telephoned to the hotel, thinking Worth or
Jones had taken the car out, perhaps.
"Don't let Torpedo leave Creek's garage for any purpose." This sentence
in Phil's telegram rang in Billy's ears. What did it all mean? He looked
at his watch. Ten-forty. Way and MacLester would arrive at eleven, he
thought. Then, "Have you telephoned Port Greeley and other places to be
on the lookout for Coster and the car?" The question was addressed to
Fobes, pacing excitedly about, accomplishing nothing.
No, he had had no time, the policeman answered. Coster's escape was not
discovered until long after nine. There had been scarcely a chance to
turn around before the theft of the Torpedo was also reported.
"You better be telephoning, perhaps," Worth suggested. "We will meet
that eleven o'clock train and, with the car to go in, maybe we can all
help you some."
* * * * *
Phil Way's eyes glistened and he smiled with a delight so inexpressible
he made no effort to put his thoughts into words. He had just read the
telegram from Billy and Paul, handed him at the Syracuse Automobile
club's downtown quarters.
"Can it be true?" asked Dave in wonder. "Why don't they--where was the
car and--"
"Course it's true!" cried Phil joyously. "But I do think they might have
spent four or six cents more to tell us something about it. They kept
right down to ten words all right!"
MacLester was for starting to Griffin at once. "But we can't," Way
remonstrated. "We've got to stay by Mr. Rack and don't you
remember--half that reward?"
However, the two boys did hurry away immediately to Mr. Bob Rack's
office. He was out. The stenographer said he would return soon and the
lads waited.
Detective Rack appeared greatly pleased with the telegram from Billy and
Paul. "A little more information might have helped us; still, perhaps,
we do not need it," said he. "We will all go to Griffin this evening.
Would you wire your friends there to meet us at--" he paused and glanced
into a book of time-tables--"to meet us at the train due there at eleven
o'clock?"
With so much to occupy their thoughts and tongues, Dave and Phil found
train time and their meeting with the detective at the station at hand
without one dull minute having passed. And though they had discussed the
evident ability and the possible plans of Robert Rack from all angles,
they were no nearer a conclusion as to what he meant to do than they
were to guessing how Jones and Worth had recovered the Big Six--a
question they were pleasantly impatient to have answered.
Not by word or look did Bob Rack reveal one whit of what he had found
during the day to the pair of his youthful admirers, who had a seat
opposite him, while the train bore rapidly on toward Griffin. When he
talked about the case at all it was only to ask a few questions--some of
them far removed from the problem in hand, the boys thought. For
instance when he desired to know whether there was plenty of lighting
gas in the tank of the Torpedo, both were puzzled, though they answered
that there was.
"We were extremely fortunate in getting away to-night. Every hour counts
now," said Mr. Rack, "but as I have some papers to look over I'll get at
them."
Swiftly through the summer night the train sped on. The detective seemed
to be occupied with nothing more important than some road maps, but his
companions did not venture to interrupt him and in their own
conversation spoke in low tones. The distance seemed very great,
somehow, to the impatient boys. But at last----
"Here we are!" said Robert Rack, even before Phil or Dave were aware of
it, and a moment later the lights of Griffin came into view.
I shall not undertake to tell in detail of the conflicting emotions with
which Billy and Paul greeted their friends and with which they all, Mr.
Rack included, gathered beside the Big Six while Worth quickly told of
the escape of Coster and the Torpedo's disappearance.
"A little faster than I expected," mused the detective, in that same
easy, gentle tone. Apparently _he_ was no more disturbed than if Billy
had said it looked like rain, which, in fact, was the case.
"But this man in jail--_we_ didn't tell you anything about him, Mr.
Rack. We didn't know it ourselves," Phil spoke up anxiously. For it will
be remembered that Chief Fobes' prisoner had not appeared in the
situation at all at the time Way and MacLester left Griffin. "Or did you
know without our _telling_ you?" Phil added, his own mind in a whirl of
confused thoughts.
"Oh, I have not been idle to-day," smiled Detective Bob. Then more
seriously, but still in his affable, pleasing way, quite as though he
were planning a little outing, he continued, "Now I'll need some help.
The best driver take the wheel. I'll sit beside him. The rest of you
ride behind and if I may ask so much, no one will leave the car except
as I may request it."
Immediately Phil nodded to Dave to take the driver's place. In an
instant Bob Rack was in the seat beside him, the others in the tonneau.
"Just as fast as is consistent with a reasonable degree of safety now,"
Mr. Rack said, placidly. "First, to Creek's garage."
The Big Six moved swiftly away, throwing always a flood of light ahead,
its gleaming oil lamps seeming to be but a streak of white to those who
watched it pass.
In a minute's time the detective apparently had seen all he wished to
see at the small garage. While he looked the place over Way, at his
request, was locating Chief Fobes by phone. The policeman came from the
hotel on the run when told that Mr. Bob Rack wanted him. For perhaps
five minutes he and the detective talked in Willie Creek's office.
"That fellow Coster got out about nine o'clock. He must have got off
with the Torpedo about half-past nine. About a two hours' start of us,"
said Billy Worth to his friends in the tonneau. There was no doubt in
his mind, whatever, that the jail-bird had flown in the stolen machine.
"Funny that the only thing Mr. Rack 'specially noticed in all we could
tell him, Bill, was about the planks that had been carried from over the
hill to run the Six down the bank on," observed Paul Jones,
thoughtfully.
"Looks a lot like Hipp and Earnest, so far as the hiding of our car
goes, Mack," Billy added to Paul's idea, for Dave was an interested
listener.
"In with you! Speed now, David, if there's such a thing!" This from
Detective Bob, the first words to Phil standing beside the car, the
second order to MacLester at the wheel. And as the Six instantly
responded,--"Out to the right-hand fork, and not a minute to lose!" he
said.
There was unmistakable authority and command in his manner. One could
have thought of nothing but instant obedience. Yet from his smile and
gentle tone it seemed that he might have said, "I declare, it's a very
pleasant evening."
Their hearts beating hard with the excitement of adventure and the rapid
ride, the Auto Boys vainly speculated, each in his own thoughts, upon
the unknown plans and intentions of the detective.
"Turn right! We're doing famously, but--" Without a sign of question, or
any movement save a quick, short nod to say that he heard, MacLester
obeyed Bob Rack's order. Like a flying specter, the Big Six shot down
the little grade where the lonely Right Fork branched off, and on and
on.
Not a word was spoken. Scurrying masses of cloud swept the sky above and
only at intervals did rifts appear where the moon shone through,
relieving for the moment the heavy darkness. Over to the south and back
to the west the inky clouds were rolling up like wind-tossed mountains.
Flashes of lightning came more and more often, and after each the
thunder crashed or rumbled in the distance. The lonely woodlands, and
the wildness of the unused, brush-grown fields were almost terrifying as
each sharp and sudden glare fell for an instant on them.
All within a second the flying car drew near and passed the darker
shadows that marked the miller's grim old house, the mill, the pond, the
icehouse. Over the bridge and up the grade--a stretch of level road,
then down the slope to the swampy spot where the Six was ditched that
other time, then up again and on!
"Stop here, David." Always that same easy, gentle tone, but Mack obeyed
the order instantly.
"You know this road. Could you go forward without lights?" And without
waiting for an answer, "Will you put them out, Way?"
Every light was extinguished. The car stood in total darkness, but stood
for a second only. "Just as quietly as you can," requested Mr. Rack, as
MacLester slipped the clutch to place again.
"Now," said the detective, "I am going to tell you that this may be a
wild goose chase, though I think not. I don't believe any of you will
need leave the car, but, Phil, you take this revolver. If you hear me
shout, 'close in,' come to me instantly. The rest of you stand ready for
any instructions that may be necessary."
Almost noiselessly the big machine purred forward, more slowly now but
still at good speed. In wonder and excitement the Auto Boys sat silent
as the darkness round them. And while _they_ were at tension that
strained every nerve, the calm tranquillity of Mr. Bob Rack was, by
contrast, the more amazing.
"I suppose," said he, softly, quite as if he might have been gently
musing before a pleasant fireplace in the quiet of home, "I suppose the
truest words ever put in verse are those which say----
"'Truth crushed to earth will rise again.
"But error, wounded, writhes in pain
"And dies amidst her worshipers.'
"And there," he said as if he were but speaking to himself, "there is
the whole ground work, the unfailing foundation that we must work upon,
whether we are detectives or doctors or anything else. There is no such
thing as successful deception. This case is an excellent illustration,
and I must tell you about it later. It is an old, old error, a monstrous
lie that has reached its end to-night, I firmly believe."