CHAPTER VI.
THE HOMEMADE SPEEDER.
What Matt saw was an ordinary hand car equipped with a two-cylindergasoline engine. Across one end of the car was a bench, tightly boltedto the framework; back of this was a shorter bench for the driver ofthe queer machine. The king of the motor boys examined the car witha good deal of curiosity. Power was communicated to the rear axle bychain and sprocket. The gasoline tank was under the driver's bench, andhe unscrewed the cap and tested the fuel supply by means of a cleantwig picked up from the shelf.
"Oh, she's loaded full," wheezed Bunce. "I filled her myself, notmore'n ten minutes ago."
"Do you know anything about motors, Bunce?" inquired Matt, giving themariner a sharp look.
"Ay, that I do--in a way. I can turn on the oil and the spark whenI wants to start, an' I can cut 'em off an' jam on the brakes whenI wants to stop. That's all ye got to know in runnin' these benzinemachines."
"Where does this belong?"
"Track inspector owns it. Grattan an' me borried it." Bunce grinned."When we're done with the machine, we'll give it back."
"We'll make a picture, pard," grumbled McGlory, "trailin' along withthis tinhorn on a stolen speeder."
"Avast, I say!" growled Bunce. "Ye're too free with your jaw tackle.Lend a hand, an' let's get her on the track an' make off. The sectiongang'll be out purty soon, an' we want to be away afore they see us."
"Sure you do," agreed McGlory sarcastically. "It'll be healthier for mypard and me, too, I reckon, if we're absent when the section men comealong. That's why you wanted to make such an early start, eh?"
Without more ado, the motor boys helped Bunce get the speeder down theslope and upon the rails.
"Any trains coming or going at this hour?" asked Matt, with suddenthought.
"Say," jeered McGlory, "it would be fine if we went head on into alocal passenger!"
"No trains comin' or goin', mate," said Bunce. "That's another reasonfor the early start. Want me to run the thing?"
"I'll do the running," answered Matt. "You climb up in front withMcGlory."
Bunce and McGlory got on the front bench. Matt "turned the engine over"by running with the speeder for a few steps, then climbed to his seat,and they began laboring up a stiff grade through the ravine.
The road was full of curves, and when it couldn't go around a hill itwent over it.
From his talk with Bunce, the night before, Matt had been under theimpression that the stolen car was an automobile, and he had made uphis mind to return the car to its owner--if the man's name could belearned--after it had been used for running down Philo Grattan. Now,that he had discovered that the car was a track speeder, he was noless resolved to hand it over to the railroad company on the return toCatskill.
The speeder performed fairly well, considering that it must have beenknocked together in the company's shops by men whose knowledge of theirwork was not extensive. A secondhand automobile engine had furnishedthe motor.
"This isn't so bad," remarked McGlory, as they ducked around theshoulder of a hill, still on the up grade, with the motor fretting andpounding. "A motor ride's a motor ride, whether you're on an a?roplane,or rubber tires, or steel rails."
"This is what they call a joy ride, Joe," called Matt, from the rear."The owner of the car doesn't know we're out with it. I'll return it tothe railroad company when we're through with our morning's work."
"That's you. I hope the railroad company don't find out we've got itbefore we give it back. Gee, man, how she's workin'!"
"Fine day an' clear weather for fillin' the bill," remarked Bunce. "Didye come armed, mateys?"
"Sufferin' hold-ups!" exclaimed McGlory. "Did you think for a minute,Bunce, we'd jump into this without being heeled?"
The cowboy, as he spoke, reached behind him and drew a short,wicked-looking six-shooter from his hip pocket.
Bunce recoiled.
"Where'd you get that, Joe?" asked Matt.
"Borrowed it from the hotel clerk."
"Well, put it away. I don't think we're going to need it. If we findGrattan there'll be three of us to take care of him. He's alone, Isuppose, Bunce?"
"Sailin' by himself, mate," answered the mariner. "Better le' me takethe gun, my hearty," he added, to McGlory.
"Speak to me about that!" scoffed the cowboy. "Why?"
"I'll have to go for'ard when we come close to the place, an' if Philogets vi'lent, I'll look at him over the gun, an' it'll be soothin'."
"I'm able to soothe him, I reckon, no matter whether you're ahead orbehind."
The speeder was making a terrific clatter. Everything rattled--thebrake shoes barged against the wheel flanges, the engine rocked on itsbed, and the levers jarred in their guides. In order to talk, and makethemselves heard, those aboard had to lift their voices.
"Sufferin' Bedlam!" cried McGlory. "It's a wonder Grattan and Buncewere ever able to steal a rattletrap like this and get away with it.We're making more noise than a limited express."
Suddenly the motor gave a flash and a sputter and went out of business.In a twinkling the car lost headway and began sliding back down thegrade toward Catskill. Matt threw on the brakes. The rear wheelslocked, but still the car continued to slide downward. Shutting offthe power, Matt dropped into the roadbed over the back of the bench,cleared the rails at a leap, and wedged one of the wheels with a stone.He had been obliged to work rapidly, for the car was on the move, andgoing faster and faster, as its weight gathered headway. But the stonesufficed, and the speeder was brought to a standstill.
"What took us aback, like that?" demanded Bunce.
"Too much gasoline," answered Matt, tinkering with the supply pipe,"and I couldn't check it with the lever control."
"This is a great old chug cart," laughed McGlory. "The railroad companyought to have been willing to pay somebody for running away with it.How'd you ever get over this road with it, Bunce?"
"When I came over the road it was downhill," answered the mariner, "an'all I had to do was to keep the craft on her course, an' scud alongunder bare poles."
"You had to climb a hill before you took the down grade, didn't you?"
"Ay, so I did, but the car came up the hill easy enough."
Matt soon had the valve in the supply pipe adjusted, and all hands hadto push in giving the car a start. When they were going, and the enginehad taken up its cycle, there followed a wild scramble to get aboard.This was finally accomplished, and once more they were puffing up thehill, but with less pounding than before.
"Say, Bunce," demanded McGlory suddenly, "did you take the speeder offthe track and up the slope into those bushes alone?"
"Ay, ay, mate," was the answer. "But I had a rope and tackle to help."
McGlory was convinced that Bunce was wide of the truth, and Mattinclined to the same opinion, although why the mariner wanted todeceive them in such a small matter was difficult to understand.
Presently, to the great relief of the motor boys, the top of the hillwas reached. The descent angled downward, around rocky uplifts andthrough thick timber, so that it was impossible to watch the track inadvance for any considerable distance.
The descent, on such a makeshift power car as the speeder, was fraughtwith greater perils than the climb up the mountain. No power would benecessary, for the car would go fast enough without any added impetus.In order to keep it from going too fast, and jumping the track, thebrakes would have to be judiciously used.
"We're off!" cried McGlory, as the speeder began coasting down thegrade.
Matt tried out the brakes. They were capable of slackening the pace,but as for stopping the car, no appliance could have done that.
With rear wheels locked, the speeder hurled itself down the mountain,acquiring greater and greater speed as it went. In and out of cutsthe car dashed, here and there rumbling over a trestle which gave thepassengers fearful glimpses of space below them.
McGlory and Bunce hung to their bench with both hands. There was notalking, now, for all three p
assengers were holding their breath.
Finally the descent became less steep. As the grade flattened outslowly into something approaching a level, Matt's work with thebrakes began to achieve results. By degrees the mad flight of the carcommenced to slacken.
"Sharp curve ahead!" sang out McGlory, heaving a deep breath of reliefas the car continued to slow down.
Matt saw the sharp turn in the track where it rounded a shoulderof rock. Naturally he could not see around the turn, and he wasspeculating as to whether their reduced speed would be sufficient tothrow the speeder off the rails at the bend, or whether the car wouldmake it safely.
Before his calculations had been brought to an end, the problem wasworking itself out.
The speeder struck the curve, whirled around it with a shrieking offlanges against the rails, and then there went up a wild yell fromMcGlory and Bunce.
Directly in front of the car was a tie across the track!
A collision with the tie was inevitable. Matt foresaw it, and clungdesperately to his bench.
"Brace yourselves!" he yelled.
The next moment they struck the tie.
The jolt was terrific. Motor Matt was thrown roughly against the seatin front, and Bunce went into the air as though shot from a gun.
Motor Matt's Mariner; or, Filling the Bill for Bunce Page 6