Yet her waiting, listening attitude held him. She was evidently expecting someone. If the guy she had phoned up should turn out to be an all-right fellow, why, then he would just make a quiet getaway and join Sam, and no one the wiser. If, on the other hand, he should turn out to be one of these fresh rotters from the city he could let him know where to get off and see that no harm came to that silly little simp down there, just for the sake of her father who was a good old sport.
Presently Barry turned his eyes westward and noted the “roadster” darting along like a small black bug as if it had the speed of a thousand-legger. He watched it to the Pike and knew when it passed behind the old red barn that Sam would be waiting there for him should it be ten minutes or ten hours. Then he glanced to the south and saw the other car, coming at full speed down toward the bridge. Now, if he was right this would be his city man. There were two other cars coming, Eli Ward’s old gray limousine that he bought for two hundred and fifty dollars and fixed up himself, and the grocery delivery truck, speeding recklessly back from the afternoon rounds. But this was a strange car he saw at a glance, and presently it came to a halt just below the group of chestnut trees, and a head came out and looked around. The car jerked on a few feet farther, and the man got out looking around him uncertainly. He measured the distance from the bridge with his eye and began an ascent at random, looking this way and that, furtively. As he came on, there were places where the branches were thin and his face was in full view. Barry studied him curiously. He was tall and thickset, with a heavy jowl and a tiny black moustache over his full red lips. He had taken off his hat and was mopping his face. The climb seemed to be hard on him. As he looked up once, the boy was astonished to see that he was not young and that there were bags under his eyes, puffy places that belonged to a high liver.
He’s old enough to be her grandfather! thought Barry disgustedly. What a doggone little fool!
Athalie arose and balanced on the log with outspread arms, and the man cautiously approached, a hungry bestial glint in his eye that the boy in the tree resented.
“He’s rotten!” said the boy to himself. “Gosh! What’ll I do about this? Her father oughta keep her in! Gee!”
The man was upbraiding Athalie for coming in such a noticeable dress. “Are you sure nobody saw you come?” he asked her in a surly tone, smoothing the plumpness of her bare arms with his well-groomed hand as he talked. “It won’t do to have your dad get onto us,” he added. “You’ve got to be careful, you know.”
Athalie pouted, and the man talked to her in a low rumble. Barry could not hear many words. He wished he were well out of that tree and back making a chicken run. He wished he had never gone to that fire in Frogtown nor met the new Silver man, nor taken his old worms to him! What a mess! What did folks want to be fools for?
The word “divorce” floated up once, and then something about the state line. He heard Athalie protest that she must go home and get on a white dress, but the man insisted that he could not wait, it was now or never. What on earth did it all mean? The state line was miles to the south. Premonition filled his chest. That man certainly was a rotter. He wished he could get down and punch his head, but it didn’t seem to be advisable at the moment. He didn’t know enough about things to interfere. Maybe the man just wanted to take her back to her mother. Her mother was divorced from her father. Sure, that was it. Some conspiracy to get her away to her mother again. Well, why worry? Wouldn’t that be a good thing for Mr. Greeves? From all he had heard the night before, all the gossip that had been going around the town that day, he would not expect his new friend to be deeply grieved at his daughter’s disappearance. And yet—he didn’t like that man’s face! Of course, he might be her uncle or something coming after her. But anyhow, he didn’t like the way the man felt her wrist. It wasn’t nice. Gosh, she was just a kid! Just a foolish little kid. Gosh! He’d like to punch that man’s head even if he was her uncle!
While he was thinking these things the two below him suddenly got up and began to move down toward the road. The man made the girl put on her cloak and turn the white fur inside, out of sight. He made her hold up her scarlet dress so it wouldn’t show below the black and tuck her red hat under the cloak, and then he pointed down the road to where a clump of bushes was embowered with wild honeysuckle close to the roadside, making a complete refuge, and the girl hurried off and crept under it. The man waited, hidden in the grove till the bread wagon passed by and then went down to where he had parked his car.
A little way up the hill in a shelter of laurel bushes a tramp looked out with greedy eyes like an old bird of prey and watched the girl.
Barry waited only long enough to see the man turn around, drive to the honeysuckle arbor, and stop. Then he began quickly to slide down the tree. As he reached the ground he heard the purr of the engine starting again, and his feet hardly touched the sod as he sprang away along the ridge above the creek to where a log spanned the water. Across like a bird in flight and up the opposite bank he ran. Now this field, and the roadster waited for him. “Over!” he shouted to Sam as he came panting up the hill and vaulted the fence. “We gotta hurry! Took me longer ‘n I expected.”
“Got’cher knife?” queried Sam as he moved over and gave Barry the wheel.
“Yep,” said Barry pulling his knife out of his pocket for a brief glimpse and started his engine.
“Say, which way you going, Blink? You don’t wanta turn round. I turned here on purpose. You said you were going after Beazley.”
“That’s all right, Sam. We gotta make the state line now before another guy gets there. You sit tight.”
Sam perceived that Blink had had one of his inspirations. This was an expedition! He settled his lank length on the airy structure of his seat and prepared to enjoy himself. Sam had pale-blue eyes under golden lashes, carroty straight hair that stuck up like bristles, a gaunt mouth, and was peppered with freckles. He remembered contentedly that his mother was making apple dumplings for supper when he went in for the arnica. He glanced at Blink’s hand and noticed that the rag had disappeared. A smudge of blood on the finger was all that remained of the accident.
“Have any trouble findin’ yer knife, Blink?”
“Nope.”
The roadster was going like a bullet through the air now, its four wheels scarcely seemed to travel the earth. They had rounded the top of the hill and curved down into the lower thoroughfare. Far ahead on the road another car like a speck appeared and disappeared. Barry eyed it steadily as he shot ahead, the speck in the distance growing visibly larger mile by mile. He let the roadster out a trifle more and watched the distance grimly. Was this his man? He didn’t want to waste time.
Sam pulled his hat over his eyes and flipped up his collar with a lank hand. His teeth were chattering.
“Gee! Blink, this is—grrr–reat!” he gulped and held on tight, a trifle pale under the freckles.
Barry shot ahead silently. Was that a glint of scarlet fluttering out the side of the car or only a budded maple branch by the road?
At last they were within hailing distance, and Barry let down his speed a trifle. He didn’t want to pass before the crossroad, now half a mile ahead. Strange he saw no sign of anyone on the backseat of that car, and only one head appeared at the front. If that was his man what had he done with the girl? If it wasn’t his man it was a pity to waste any more time and lose the trail. He began to cast about in his mind where his quarry could have gone if this was not the right car and to plan for instant action in case he found out his mistake.
The car ahead did not turn off at the crossroads, and three minutes later Barry shot ahead. As he passed the other car he was sure he caught a glimpse of something red like a big ball suddenly dropping down out of sight in the backseat.
“Watch that car, Sam!” he ordered grimly.
Sam fixed his pale eye on a bit of mirror fastened in midair over the engine, but the car seemed to be coming on steadily enough.
“Watch if there’s
more than one person in it.”
Sam shifted the gum between his teeth and gave himself to more-concentrated effort.
“Thought I saw something move in the backseat,” he said at length. “There it went again. Mighta been mistaken though.”
Barry thought he saw it, too. He suddenly ground his brakes on and sprang off to kneel before his engine.
“Nut loose,” he explained to the astonished Sam who had been nearly precipitated to the ground by the sudden halt. He wasn’t quite sure which car Blink meant “the nut” traveled in.
Barry’s car was well into the road. A passing vehicle must turn out if it went by. Barry reclined by a wheel, apparently deeply absorbed. At the very instant, however, when the other car was about to curve by him, he was as by a miracle upright on his feet in the middle of the remaining road space, with one arm raised in distress. The oncoming driver had either to stop or submit to being a murderer. As the man ground on his brakes and jerked to a violent stop he let out an ugly oath, but Barry, unconcerned, asked nonchalantly: “Len’ me a wrench?”
“No!” said the man shortly. “Mine’s lost! Get out of my way!”
Barry lifted his cap from his curls politely and grinned.
“Thank you!” he said, with his eye on the backseat and stepped out of the way. The car shot ahead, but Barry had seen what he was after, a big black eye peering up over the door of the car, covered by a traveling blanket that seemed exceedingly alive. A flash of a white arm and a dash of scarlet showed against the darkness of the backseat as the car swept by, and Barry was satisfied. He was on the right track.
“What’s eatin’ you, Barry? The wrench’s in its place under the cushion.” Sam eyed him puzzled. It wasn’t like Barry to forget anything.
“Oh, it is?” said Barry innocently, swinging up on his seat. “Pile in, boy, we gotta hurry.”
Sam scrambled back into place again as the roadster leaped forward. The other car was some distance ahead now. Barry seemed to have lost interest in it. Sam couldn’t make him out. Somehow Sam never could quite make out Barry. He said so to the boys once, and Ben Holden told him it was because he hadn’t any sense of humor, but that troubled Sam still more, because what did a sense of humor have to do with understanding a person who was perfectly grave and serious?
Whenever they came near a crossroad or a village, Barry speeded up. Sam kept hoping he would stop and buy something to eat. He kept remembering those apple dumplings. The sun was getting lower and lower. A dank little breath swept up from the valley, full of sleepy violets and drowsy bees humming. The birds were calling good night. Sam’s legs were long for the space allowed in the roadster. He grew uneasy.
“Say, what time do you expect to get home for supper?” he questioned, shifting a little and putting his hand under his knee surreptitiously to ease the stiffness.
“Don’t expect!” said Barry crisply. “If you do you might get disappointed. Hungry, Sam? Let you out on the road anywhere you say, if you like.”
“Oh, no,” said Sam detecting displeasure in his idol’s voice. “Oh, no, no, I’m just enjoying this, havin’ the time of my young life. Gee, it’s great. Only I was wondering what your plans were?”
“That depends,” said Barry and said no more. With shut lips the two whizzed through the country, watching a little black speck ahead that grew dimmer and dimmer as the light of the sun failed.
Then suddenly it seemed quite dark. The other car was only a place of blackness in the darkness; one could not be sure if it was there or only had been. There were lights ahead. They were nearing a town. The roadster reached the top of a hill leading down into the main street among dwellings. A little trolley like a toy plied to and fro with childish bells and lights. A church bell rang with a sweet wholesome call to prayer. Cottages appeared. A child under a light with a green porcelain shade looking at a book. A family in the dining room eating their supper. Pleasant thought. Dumplings, apple dumplings with plenty of goo! Ummmmm! Sam looked wistfully back.
The other car at the foot of the hill turning into the main street, stopped for an instant by the trolley. Barry made time and arrived in its immediate vicinity as it started on again. Barry slowed up. He let several cars and trucks and foot passengers get between him and the open road. Sam eyed him wonderingly. The other car had gone on. Sam hadn’t noticed it particularly.
Barry saw it slow up in front of a drugstore, and immediately he ran his car down a side street by the blank side of a real estate office closed for the night and sprang out.
“Watch me, Sam! Keep yer eyes peeled,” he said to his astonished vassal. “If I don’t come back soon, you folla. I gotta get that car and its contents back to Silver Sands t’night! See? But mind you keep yer mouth shut.”
He was gone in the darkness, and Sam, whirling dazedly round on his unsteady seat, saw him vanishing round the car that was parked in front of the drugstore. An instant more and he heard the door on the driving side slam and the engine begin to purr.
“By gosh!” Sam said and unfolded himself to his full height on the curb. “He’s a nut if there ever was one,” said Sam to the roadster aloud.
The other car was moving! It was passing out of sight! Blink was nowhere to be seen. Sam must move, too, if he was not to lose him. Sam clambered to his task with sudden panic and threw in the clutch.
“By gosh!” he ejaculated, but the roadster was already going so fast that his words fell backward on the curb unheard in the darkness. Sam had already assumed his new importance. Apple dumplings were forgotten for the time. He had to get that roadster home or he’d hear about it all the rest of his mortal days. Besides he knew his mother would keep plenty of dumplings warm for him on the back of the stove. He made out to see a dim outline of a car in the darkness ahead and followed, being madly aware of an excited man on the pavement behind him shouting and waving his arms.
Chapter 19
Anne Truesdale, bringing another plate of angel cake that had been put aside for the master, saw the minister’s car through the front window and urging the plate upon Roberta hastened to the door to meet them.
It was Greeves who was walking ahead, and she put up her hands as if in prayer and almost curtsied in her agony, her words tumbling out in true old-country style: “Oh, Master Pat, I’d not be troublin’ ye, but the young ladies is in there, and ye’ll have to tell me what ye want done. I’ve fed ‘em an’ fed ‘em, everything there is left in the house, tryin’ to keep ‘em from realizin’ they’ve been insulted, an’ now you’ll just have to do something about it. It’ll be a scandal in the neighborhood in five minutes after I let them be going, for Emily Bragg has an awful tongue in her head, an’ she lives next door to Arden Philips’s wife.”
“Why, Anne, what’s the matter? Try not to be excited. Tell me, what has happened? Who is in the house?”
“It’s the young ladies, the daughters of yer uncle’s old friends.
Mary Truman next door and Roberta Moffat and them, six of them, nice girls as ever was, come to call on your daughters. And Miss Athalie first kept them waitin’, an’ then she come down all in a red party dress with that bare a neck, and no sleeves at all, and a little red hat like a red hen atop her, and then monstrous cherries a dangling—”
Anne was almost sobbing as she talked and was unaware that Bannard and Silver had come up and were standing behind her.
“Never mind, Anne,” said Greeves soothingly. “It can’t be so very bad. You say they’re only little girls.”
“‘Igh-school girls, sir, an’ comin’ on young ladies. Oh, but you don’t know sir, it was werry bad, werry bad indeed, sir. She come in an’ called herself Miss Greeves, and she offered them her smoking box, an’ then she orders tea an’ walks out that imperious you’d think she was a queen, sayin’ as how ‘twas late an’ she had a engagement to go to in the city an’ see a carabay on a roof, sir, whatever that may be, sir. An’ she’s gone—an’ I don’t know what to do with ‘em. It’ll be all over town before the night,
Master Pat—”
“Is there somebody in there to call, did you say, Mrs. Truesdale?” interrupted Silver suddenly. “Why, I’ll go right in!”
Silver ran up the steps and into the hall, flinging off her hat in her transit and dropping it on the hall table, tossing her gloves after it. She entered the drawing room where the embarrassed girls were huddled together, trying to get rid of napkins, eating furtive pieces of cake from the plate on the edge of the tea tray, and planning a hasty exit before any more stupefying and insulting daughters were presented to their indignant gaze.
“Oh, how lovely of you all to run over so soon!” exclaimed Silver ruffling up her hair with a merry attempt at smoothing it. “Now, tell me who you are. I’m Silver Greeves, I suppose you know—or perhaps you don’t. Call me Silver, please. I’ll feel more at home.
And what’s your name? Mary Truman. Oh, you live next door, don’t you? Father was telling me about you this morning at breakfast. We’ll be friends, won’t we? Now you introduce the rest.”