The Speedwell Boys and Their Racing Auto: or, A Run for the Golden Cup

CHAPTER XXIII
QUEER ACTIONS OF NO. 41

Dan stood silently, his teeth on his lower lip, his face heavy with thought. Billy continued:

“How ever did Chance do it?”

“That’s where he went when he got up so early this morning at the inn. He went to the gasoline station, bribed somebody there, and got the cans filled with water. One thing is sure, we’ll make whoever helped him suffer for it.”

“But what good will that do?” demanded Billy, “when we have lost the race?”

“We haven’t lost the race!” snapped his brother.

“We’re stalled here, I tell you!” cried Billy, waving his arms excitedly.

“I know it.”

“What are you going to do for power? How you going to get to the next station – fly? You say the word and I’ll run all the way to the nearest town and buy the gasoline, and bring it back in a wagon. But it will take oceans of time.”

“I know it,” gritted Dan. “We’ve got to have it quicker than that – listen!”

“Another car coming. Another set of joshers,” complained Billy, who did not like being made a target for fun.

The car they heard was coming at full speed. Dan hesitated, and then stepped around the drab car and looked up the road. The running automobile appeared.

“Hooray!” yelled Billy. “It’s Mr. Briggs’ car. He’ll help us.”

The huge “forty-one” was plain upon the hood of the automobile. As it came on, however, the chauffeur showed no intention of reducing speed.

This was not a bad bit of road where the Speedwell boys were stalled. Car forty-one was evidently striving to make up some of the miles it had lost on the previous day. It came on like the wind!

Dan and Billy both waved their hands. The car did not swerve, nor did the chauffeur pay them the compliment of pulling down in the least.

The huge Postlethwaite swept on, was guided around the stalled car with skill, and rushed past and on around the next curve in the road – and all so quickly that the boys were speechless for a moment with surprise.

“Did you ever?” finally gasped Billy.

“Henri never even winked at us,” growled Dan.

“And if he had, you wouldn’t have seen that wink,” observed his brother, with a nervous gasp. “Say! that was mean!”

“Of course, they didn’t have to stop.”

“No. But it wouldn’t have hurt Mr. Briggs to pull down for a moment.”

“He never even looked at us.”

“No. He sat in there beside Henri, ready to help him take the curves. I never thought he’d be so mean,” complained Billy.

“Here’s another!” exclaimed his brother.

They turned to see a second automobile come around the bend in the road. It was not going so fast. It was numbered thirty-seven.

Before it reached the Speedwells it slowed down and the man at the wheel demanded:

“Did you see that maroon car just now?”

“Of course!” exclaimed Dan and Billy together.

“It was number forty-one, wasn’t it?” demanded the chauffeur of thirty-seven, and he seemed very angry.

“Yes.”

“Well, we’re going to report that car. It ought to be barred out of the race,” sputtered the man.

“What’s that?” gasped Dan, while Billy looked, open-mouthed, at the angry automobilist.

“I tell you, it ought to be barred out,” cried the stranger, and his companion agreed with a vigorous nod. “They come pretty near taking a wheel off of us. Look at that scratch along the side of our car; will you?”

“I see it,” admitted Dan, vastly puzzled.

“That maroon car did it,” cried the man. “It ought to be – ”

“But say!” blurted out Billy. “That was Mr. Briggs’ car – Mr. Briggs who started this endurance test – the man who offers the gold cup!”

“Mr. Raleigh Briggs!” cried the angry man.

“That’s the number of his car – forty-one,” Dan interposed, quickly.

“Well, he ought to be spoken to,” said the man, more mildly. “We were giving him the right of the road as fast as possible; I never saw a man drive so recklessly in all my life!”

The angry automobilist was driving on, when Dan said:

“By the way, can you let us have a gallon of juice? We are stalled – ”

“Haven’t any to spare!” snapped the man, as he threw on his speed.

“Ha!” ejaculated Billy. “I wish Mr. Briggs had tipped him into the ditch!”

“If it was Mr. Briggs,” muttered Dan, but his brother did not hear him.

“What’ll we do?” queried Billy again. “You don’t mean to stay here and beg of every car you see, do you? They’ll all turn us down.”

“All these cars aren’t driven by such fellows,” growled Dan.

“But say! When Mr. Briggs himself would act so mean – ”

“Here’s another!” cried Dan, and this time he leaped into the very center of the road, determined to make the coming car slow down, at least.

When it shot into sight Billy gave a sudden cheer.

“Number fifty-three! Oh, Dannie! that’s Mr. Robert!”

But at that word his brother stepped quickly out of the way. He could not hold up Darringford, who had already been so kind to them. But the young proprietor of the Darringford Machine Shops began to slow down as soon as he saw that the drab car was in trouble.

“What’s the matter, boys?” he shouted, craning his head out of the car to see them.

“Oh, Mr. Robert!” cried Billy, boldly. “Can you lend us a gallon of gasoline?”

“What! gone stale between towns?” laughed the young man. “I am surprised at you, boys.”

“It was not our fault, I assure you,” said Dan, quietly. “Somebody played a trick on us. They filled our cans at Farmingdale with water instead of gasoline.”

“Why! that’s a despicable trick,” declared Mr. Robert, as Dan opened one of the cans and poured the water into the road.

“It has lost us nearly an hour already,” said Billy.

“It shall lose you no more time. Give me that empty can,” said Mr. Robert, quickly. “Take one of our full ones. That’s right. Now, come on, boys, and show me what your Breton-Melville can do!” and, the exchange being made, he waved to his chauffeur to go on again.

And the Speedwells were not far behind him. They filled their tank after draining out the water. They had to start slowly, and it took them nearly an hour to run the next ten miles. Then they reached a gasoline station and were very sure that the right fluid was run into their cans.

The Breton-Melville worked like a charmed car after that one accident. On the long grade which they struck about eleven o’clock – the climb over the mountain range – she acted perfectly. But eighteen miles an hour was her best speed going up.

At the summit (they reached the Tip Top House at three) the boys halted to overhaul their gear and oil up. They hoped to make Greenbaugh, in the valley, before the end of their ten mile run; but they were eighty-seven miles away. They had traveled already a hundred and forty-two miles from the Holly Tree Inn. The trick Chance Avery had played them certainly had set them back in this day’s running a good many miles!

But several of the early cars to start – the small numbers – had been passed by the Speedwells; as they figured it coming up the mountain there were only fifteen cars ahead of them, including number seven.

“And Mr. Briggs’ car,” added Billy. “She must be tearing down the mountain already. Hey!” he called to one of the men working around the stables, “has number forty-one passed on? Of course it has! How long ago?”

“Number forty-one?” repeated the man, referring to a list of the cars he carried in his pocket. “No, sir. She ain’t showed up yet.”

“Why, she passed us miles back!” cried Billy, and Dan looked up from his work in surprise, too.

“No. She hasn’t come,” said the man, with confidence.

“Why – why – what does it mean?” gasped the younger Speedwell. “It can’t be possible that we passed Mr. Briggs anywhere, and missed him.”

“He must be ahead of us,” agreed Dan.

“I know my list is right,” said the man. “I been noting every car that’s in the race. You see how I’ve put a star against those that have got by. Number forty-one ain’t one of ’em.”

“A big maroon car – a Postlethwaite,” suggested Dan.

“No, sir. Ain’t no maroon car gone through. I’m mighty sure of that!”

“Well, what do you know about that?” murmured Billy, staring at his brother. “Think that was a delusion back there on the road? Maybe we didn’t see Mr. Briggs’ car, either?”

“Maybe we didn’t,” replied Dan, gravely. “But I guess that man in thirty-seven wouldn’t agree that it was a delusion that scratched up his panels.”

“Whew! I should say not.”

At that moment the hostler with the checked list broke in on their conversation.

“How far did you come to-day?” he asked.

“Hundred and forty miles,” grunted Billy. He wasn’t proud of their speed.

“Then you slept at Farmingdale?”

“Yep.”

“Hear about the robbery of the postoffice there before you started?”

“No!” cried Billy. “Last night?”

“Yes. Cleaned it out. Three or four thousand dollars’ worth of stamps, registered mail, and thirteen hundred dollars in cash. Nice little haul for some band of robbers,” said the hostler.

He went away and Dan and Billy stared at each other for a moment. Billy put his thoughts in words first:

“The maroon car stood in that bridge over the Farmingdale River last night, when we came through. No honest car would have hidden there.”

“Where is Mr. Briggs and the real forty-one car?” demanded Dan.

“Oh, Dan! that couldn’t have been him who drove by us so fast this morning.”

“And scratched number thirty-seven, too,” said Dan.

“It’s the other maroon car,” declared Billy, excitedly. “It’s the bank robbers.”

“But where is Mr. Briggs?” demanded his brother, again.

“Goodness only knows. Those thieves are onto the fact that their car is the mate to Mr. Briggs’ auto. It’s plain they are using that fact to hide their tracks.”

“And meanwhile,” repeated Dan, for the third time, “what has happened to Mr. Briggs?”

“I give it up!”

“I’m going to find out,” declared Dan. “Here! you ’tend to this. I want to telephone.”

But when he ran in to the hotel office he found one of the racing timekeepers there and from him he learned that Mr. Briggs’ car was reported about fifty miles back on the road. It had suffered a breakdown.

“Are you sure it’s his car?” demanded Dan. “I tell you that there is another maroon car on the road.”

“Not in the list of racers,” said the timekeeper.

“No, sir. But are you sure it is Mr. Briggs that has broken down?”

“I just spoke to him over the telephone. I know him personally. I know his voice.”

“Then there can be no mistake. But I believe that there is another maroon car running under Mr. Briggs’ number,” and Dan explained briefly what he knew about the car belonging to, or used by, the men who had robbed Mr. Sudds and the Farmers’ Bank.

“This robbery of the postoffice at Farmingdale last night,” continued Dan Speedwell, “looks very much like the work of the same crowd, too. Besides, my brother and I are quite sure that these men passed us on the road this morning. It was not Mr. Briggs in that maroon car, that is sure. He would have stopped and spoken to us when he saw that we were stalled.”

“I’ll send your information up and down the line,” promised the timekeeper. “But there certainly has been no maroon car past here – in either direction – to-day, or yesterday.”

When Dan got back to the car, Billy already had her cranked up. They ran swiftly out into the highway, reached the down grade, shut off power, and began to coast. For some ten or fifteen miles the map showed that the road into the valley was very crooked; they dared not put much power to their car. And sometimes when she merely coasted, the speedometer showed a forty-five and fifty mile an hour pace!

Eighty-seven miles in an hour and three-quarters – that was the work cut out for them. Half of it was down grade, at least; but it was only when they were within twenty miles of the foot of the mountain that the Speedwells were able to let her out and show just what the Breton-Melville car could do on a gentle slope, and on a good road.

They took that stretch of twenty miles in seventeen minutes!

At the end of that sharp run Billy counted on his fingers and declared that there were but eight cars ahead of them.

It was four o’clock when they drove through New Hapsburg at a twelve mile an hour rate. Suddenly they came upon a car around which there was quite a crowd. It was one of the contesting machines, Dan and Billy knew, and as they shut off their engine they heard several wrangling voices in the crowd.

“I tell ye I don’t care anything about no race!” cried one harsh voice. “You’re under arrest for exceeding the speed limit through the streets of this here city.”

“Another Josiah Somes!” chuckled Billy. “What car is it that’s pinched?”

“My goodness, that’s Burton Poole standing up there and waving his pocketbook,” cried Dan.

“Oh, glory!” shouted Billy. “It’s number seven.”

Then they saw Chance Avery. His face was red, and he was too angry for words. He saw the Breton-Melville car sliding past and he undoubtedly had heard Billy’s joyous exclamation. If looks could burst a tire, Dan and Billy would have had a bad blow-out right there!

“It won’t hold them long,” said Dan, as their car pulled past the crowd. “Burton will pay the fine and they’ll come after us. Their time isn’t up, it’s likely, before half-past five. They will reach Greenbaugh if we do.”

“And we’re going to reach it,” acclaimed Billy, cheerfully. “Here’s the town line, Dannie. Let her go!”

CHAPTER XXIV
AN OBSTACLE RACE

They reached the station on High street, Greenbaugh, with a few minutes to spare. There were four cars already standing at the Carpenter House, the best hotel in the place. It was too expensive an inn for the Speedwell boys, however, and they drove around to another hostelry on a side street.

Besides, the Carpenter House veranda, and the yard, and the street in front of the hotel, were full of shouting, chaffing students from the seminary. Whether Chance Avery was so very popular with his former fellow students, or not, there was a great number interested in the motor car race.

“We want to keep away from them. Then we’ll be sure to escape trouble. I don’t want to talk with Chance just now,” said Dan Speedwell. “For I’m sore and I might say something I’d be sorry for later.”

“He played us as mean a trick as ever was played,” declared Billy.

“He did indeed. But we have caught up with him again. He won’t get past the Carpenter House to-night.”

Which was a fact, for after Dan and Billy had cleaned up their car and had put their next day’s supply of gasoline under lock and key this time, to be sure of it, they went out on High street and saw Chance and Burton Poole with a crowd of college fellows, going to one of the students’ boarding houses for supper.

The Speedwells ate their own supper, and then walked about the town quietly. They learned that forty of the racing cars had reached Greenbaugh during the evening. The streets were crowded with sight-seers. Late in the evening the seminary boys made a demonstration.

They had fireworks on the campus and then paraded the streets in autos and afoot, Burton Poole’s car in the lead with great placards on it.

Red fire and a noisy demonstration accompanied the parade; but the town police kept good order. There was a big, six-seated car that belonged in the town, and was hired by the seminary boys. This had a prominent place in the parade, and the next morning, when Dan and Billy got out at daybreak, they saw this machine, loaded with noisy but sleepy-looking fellows, rolling down to the High street.

“They’ve made a night of it!” exclaimed Dan. “And I bet Chance and Burton have been with them. They’ll feel just like running an auto to-day – I don’t think!”

“All right. If they want to give themselves a handicap,” returned Billy, “I won’t complain.”

“Let’s hurry and get away. I don’t want to see Chance Avery to-day if I can help it.”

“You mean to keep ahead of him, then?” chuckled Billy.

“I’d like to.”

But when they ran their car out to the front of the Carpenter House, several of the contestants had already gotten under way, and among them was Burton Poole’s machine. The big automobile crowded with students accompanied it out of town. Number seven had nearly half an hour’s start of the Speedwells’ car.

But the Breton-Melville ran very easily. No cars passed the boys for the first five miles. Then they saw a cloud of dust ahead and realized that they were catching up with the students – and probably Poole’s car.

The six-seated observation car could not run very fast, and it was so broad and heavy that it occupied more than a fair share of the road. Dan and Billy could not see beyond this elephantine car, and did not know how near number seven was.

The road was good and their motor had been running very nicely. As the big car, with its cheering crowd, continued to fill the road, Dan was obliged to pull down a little.

“Hoot again,” said Billy. “We want to get by. If Chance and Burton want to play horse along the way, let them. We’re out for the gold cup.”

At that moment an auto came up behind them and slid by swiftly. It was number twelve. When this car came up with the big omnibus, one of the students on the back seat yelled something to the man managing the car, and it swerved out just enough to let number twelve by.

Dan tried to follow. But before he could get the nose of number forty-eight into the opening, the omnibus swung back into the middle of the road again. The highway was narrow. There was no sidewalk on either hand. It was a typical country road and on either hand was a steep bank down to a barbed wire fence. To go into the ditch would finish any car!

“Hey there!” yelled Billy, standing up. “Let us by. Don’t hog the road, fellows.”

“Who are you, sonny?” returned one of the smart boys on the back seat.

“Let ’em sit up and beg proper,” suggested another of the seminary youths.

“Take your turn, brother,” advised another of the students. “We’ve got the road now and we mean to keep it.”

“Be still, Billy,” advised Dan, quickly. “They can hold us back but a little way. The road widens soon!”

But Dan was not a good prophet that time. The students evidently intended to hold back Chance Avery’s rival at any cost. Within five minutes, after guying the Speedwells unmercifully, and holding them down to a snail’s pace, the chauffeur of the heavy car suddenly brought it square across the road, backed a little, and then halted. His car was an effectual barrier to all traffic, going in either direction!

“Oh! Oh! Oh! Some-thing’s-bust-ed!” yelled the gang in chorus.

Dan and Billy then got a sight of the road ahead. It was empty. Chance was perhaps ten miles ahead, or more. And the Speedwells were stalled. The driver of the students’ car could claim that he could not move his auto. There were no policemen about. The following contestants might be held here for an hour, or more.

Dan and Billy were helpless. And the students were having a fine time at their expense. Dan had to fairly threaten his brother to keep Billy silent; to enter into a wordy discussion with the fellows would only have pleased the scamps too well. They were primed to make sport of the Riverdale boys and undoubtedly would have handled them roughly had Dan allowed Billy to loosen his tongue.

For ten minutes the big car stood there, the chauffeur making believe fumble with the mechanism. Then suddenly there sounded a warning automobile horn from the direction of Greenbaugh. A car, in a cloud of dust, was dashing over the road toward them.

“Now, by jings!” exclaimed Billy, “they’ll have to do something.”

“No reason why they shouldn’t hold up the whole string of contestants for a while,” muttered Dan. “Wait.”

But this car did not seem to be one of the racers. At least, it had no placard on it. Suddenly Billy exclaimed:

“Isn’t that Mr. Briggs’ car? He’s caught up with us!”

“It’s not numbered,” objected Dan.

“I don’t care! It’s maroon – and a big car – ”

Meanwhile the students on the omnibus did nothing toward pulling out. The maroon car reduced speed abruptly. There were three men in it – a small one at the wheel and two others in the tonneau. All were coated and masked with dust goggles.

“What’s the matter with you?” demanded one of the men in the tonneau, standing up.

Billy caught Dan by the hand, and whispered:

“It’s him!”

Dan needed no explanation. He knew what his brother meant at once. This was the leader of the trio of bank robbers – the motor thieves. Billy knew the fellow’s voice.

A chorus of contradictory explanations were shouted by the seminary boys. It was plain that they proposed to hold up this car, too, rather than let the Speedwells by.

“You can’t move your car, eh?” snapped the man in the maroon auto.

He sprang out fearlessly and strode to the side of the huge machine. As he started to climb up to the front seat one of the fellows tried to push him back.

That particular seminary student was instantly treated to the surprise of his life. The man reached out, seized the boy’s collar, and ripped him from his hold on the car. He pitched him bodily, with one fling, into the ditch beside the road.

He then vaulted into the chauffeur’s seat, seized the lever, and started the machine. The engine was still running. Instead of starting it ahead, the man deliberately backed the car into the ditch on the other side of the road, and leaped down, leaving it there with its forward wheels in the air!

Half the students had tumbled off when the car bounced into the ditch. The maroon machine was brought by the chauffeur past the disabled omnibus, and the man who had wrecked it leaped into his own machine again.

“Quick, Billy!” whispered Dan. “We’ll get after them.”

Their own car was ready. They ran right around the big machine, in the wake of the maroon auto. The latter was speeding away along the narrow road.

“We must catch them, Dan!” cried Billy, as number forty-eight began to hum again.

“We will indeed,” agreed his brother. “It’s the robbers’ car – no doubt of it. We must hang to them until we find an officer to make the arrest. Whatever happens – whether we win the race for the golden cup, or not, we must not let that maroon car escape this time!”