CHAPTER VII
THE RACE
Then began some fun that was novel and exciting even to the OutdoorGirls, who thought they had tried just about every sport there was.
Mollie bent her straight little back over the steering wheel, gave hermore power and the big car fairly flew ahead, lessening perceptibly thedistance between it and the racer.
However, Betty, looking behind, seemed not in the least concerned. Onthe contrary, she waved her hand joyously as she recognized Mollie hadtaken her challenge. Then she too bent over the wheel with her eyesglued to the flying ribbon of road ahead.
"Betty, Betty, stop it!" cried Grace, holding frantically to her hat andthe side of the car. "Suppose we should m-meet somebody--a wagon or am-machine."
"So much the worse for it," retorted Betty gayly. "You keep your eye onMollie, Gracie dear, and tell me whether she's gaining--that's a goodgirl."
"If you think I'm going to help you break our necks--" Grace sputtered,but Betty cut her short.
"Well, if you don't I will have to look for myself," she said, addingmaliciously: "And then we will have a smash-up!"
Grace groaned and looked behind her.
"They're gaining," she cried, and then all at once the spirit of thething caught her--the contest of speed was getting into her blood. "Oh,Betty, don't let 'em," she almost screamed, above the noise of the motorand the rushing wind. "They're not more than fifty feet behind now!"
Betty gave her a swift look, smiled to herself, and once more fixed herdancing eyes on the road ahead.
"All right," she crowed. "Just watch me run away from them. I wouldn'thave had the heart," she added with a chuckle, "if Mollie hadn't broughtit all on herself."
"But they're still gaining," insisted Grace nervously, trying to lookbehind, ahead, keep her seat, hat, and dignity all at the same time."Look, Betty, they're only about thirty feet behind!"
"That's near enough," Betty decided, and leaning over suddenly, didsomething to the car that Grace never quite understood. Anyway, it hadthe desired effect. The little racer fairly leapt forward and, like ahorse that has been given his head for the first time, took the bitbetween its teeth and bolted.
Behind them Mollie looked her amazement. She was getting every bit ofspeed out of her machine of which it was capable, and then, just asvictory was within sight, Betty was doing an inconceivable, unbelievablething--she was winning the race!
Mrs. Ford and Amy had been enjoying the race tremendously, but now theyleaned forward in surprise.
"Goodness, she's beating us," cried Amy.
"No!" snapped Mollie sarcastically. "Who would have supposed it?"
"Perhaps it is because Betty's car is so much lighter," suggested Mrs.Ford consolingly. "We have all the luggage and wraps, too."
"Oh, that wouldn't make so much difference," denied Mollie, who was toogood a sportsman to make excuses for herself. "Betty's racer has thespeed, that's all."
"Well, they're just about out of sight now," said Amy, leaning backresignedly. "I only hope Betty doesn't run into anything and have asmash-up. She hasn't driven a car as much as you, Mollie."
"Oh, Betty'll take care of herself," said Mollie, though she wasslightly mollified by this tribute to her superior experience, if notsuperior speed. "I guess," she added, after a moment's reflection, "I'dbetter sell this old car and get a racer too."
Mrs. Ford laughed softly, the first time she had laughed or thought oflaughing since receiving the news of Will's being wounded.
"Don't go back on an old friend for its first offence, Mollie," shechided, adding diplomatically: "A racing car is just fine for speed, butI think your automobile is much more sociable and comfy."
"Well, I'm glad there's something nice about it," said Mollie, for shehad not yet recovered from her surprise and chagrin. "I hope," sheadded, as a sudden thought struck her, "that Betty doesn't get too farahead. I don't know this part of the country very well and Betty has themap."
"That will be the next thing," said Amy, with a sigh, and Mollie lookedat her sharply.
"What?" she demanded.
"Why, that we'll get lost," Amy explained. "Wasn't that what you meant?"
"Oh, I hope not," said Mrs. Ford, a little anxiously. "Perhaps we'll beable to see them when we round this curve, Mollie."
But they rounded several curves, and still no sign of Betty's car. Thenhappened what Mollie had secretly been fearing would happen. They cameto a crossroads and a sudden stop at one and the same moment.
"Now, what?" queried Amy, in the tone of resignation that never failedto rub Mollie the wrong way. "Something the matter with the engine?"
"No, the engine's all right," snapped Mollie, adding, irritably: "Buteverything else is all wrong."
"What, for instance?" queried Mrs. Ford soothingly. She knew that thefirst defeat Mollie had ever experienced would be bound to rankle andwas prepared to make allowances. "If the engine is all right, why don'twe go on?"
"Which way?" queried Mollie, spreading out her arms with a hopelessgesture. "There are two roads, one looks as good as the other, and wehaven't the slightest idea in the world which to take."
"Oh!" gasped Amy.
Mrs. Ford gave a low whistle as she saw the fix they were in.
"Then if Betty doesn't realize our predicament and come back prettysoon, we'll either have to stay here indefinitely, or go back the way wecame, is that it?"
"Yes," nodded Mollie, adding truthfully and more than a littleanxiously: "Only I'm not quite sure I know just how we came. As I said,this is unfamiliar country to me."
Amy groaned.
"Then we shall be lost for fair," she said. "Oh, why did Betty do such afoolish thing?"
Mollie was about to retort when a cloud of dust in the distance and afaint chug-chug made her swallow her words.
"What's that?" she cried. "It sounds like a motor. I wonder--"
"Yes, it is!" cried Amy, straining her eyes to see through the cloud ofdust. "It's only a little car, and it's coming at about ninety miles anhour."
At this reference to Betty's speed, Mollie winced a little but gave arelieved sigh nevertheless. For by this time the car was near enough tobe identified beyond doubt. It was a racer, and there was a girl at thewheel.
A few moments later Betty herself, with a grin, hailed them.
"Hello," she cried, adding as the car slowed to a standstill: "This timethe joke's on us. We were so busy running away from you that we took thewrong road. This one ends about two miles up in somebody's farm."
"It's lucky something stopped you," said Mollie dryly, adding as shecocked one eye at the sun: "Well, let's be getting along. We'll have tohurry and make up for lost time."
"Do you still want to get ahead of us?" asked Betty, as a moment latershe swung her car into the right road. "Because if you do--"
"Go on," cried Mollie, exasperated, yet beginning to laugh, for afterall Mollie was a good loser. "Some way or other I'll get even with you,Betty Nelson. Meanwhile hustle!"
And Betty hustled, with Mollie keeping just far enough behind to avoidthe cloud of dust the little car threw up. For an hour more the motorspurred rhythmically, eating up mile after mile, until finally the girlswere compelled by ravenous and healthy appetites to stop for lunch.
They had brought two big hampers, packed full with sandwiches, fruit andcake and also something to drink, and after the long ride in the openthe very thought of these delicacies brought, as Grace said, "the tearsof longing to their eyes."
As Mrs. Ford handed one of the baskets over the seat to Mollie in front,Betty and Grace tumbled out of their car and came running toward them.
"Are you going to get out and eat, in romantic fashion, by the wayside?"queried Grace, eyeing a pile of sandwiches hungrily. "Or are you goingto sit in state in the car and let us occupy the running board?"
"We'll give you one of the hampers," offered Mrs. Ford, but Molliegasped in dismay.
"Oh, please don't," she begged. "Don't you see--there are only two
ofthem to our three. And you want to give them half the lunch!"
They laughed at her, and Betty offered a solution.
"Far be it from us to rob you, Honey," she said soothingly. "We'll sitright here on this rock--"
"Oh, goodness! who cares where we sit as long as we get something,"groaned Grace. "Mollie, I'm dying."
"Well as long as you die out there it's all right," retorted Mollieunfeelingly. Nevertheless, she handed the sufferer a ham sandwich and ahard boiled egg, which the latter came as near to grabbing as her goodbreeding would permit.
However, when they had finished the lunch, burned up what odds and endsremained, and had once more started on their way, they found that theshadow of unhappiness which the excitement of the race had almostbanished, was returning again.
In front with Betty, Grace sighed so dolefully that the Little Captainlooked at her inquiringly, an action which almost brought about acollision with a tree by the wayside.
"Betty, what are you doing?"
"Trying to kill us," replied Betty serenely. "And if you give any moresighs like that, I'll do it."
"I didn't know I sighed," said Grace gloomily. "But it wouldn't be anywonder if I did. I feel as if I were made up of them--sighs, I mean."
Betty was silent a moment, then she asked suddenly:
"When does your father expect to hear from Washington?"
"Not before the end of the week, anyway. And by that time," Grace pausedto control the trembling of her lips, "nobody knows what may havehappened. For all we know Will may be--dead."
The Outdoor Girls at Bluff Point; Or a Wreck and a Rescue Page 8