CHAPTER VI
ON TO THE GOLD CUP RACES
"Yes, sir, they have went. I don't know nothing else about it," spokethe young fellow employed as general utility man in Knight & Wilder'sgarage. His principal work consisted of polishing metal and pumping uptires, but laboring under an impression that he was an automobilesalesman, he put on very swaggering airs. Just now he affected scarcelyto notice three boys who made inquiry concerning the proposed tour ofPhil Way and his friends.
Mr. Knight, coming up at the moment, told the important young gentlemanin an undertone that his deportment in the establishment was not that ofpublicity. Such being the case, he sent the youth to gather up sometools which a touring party had borrowed and left lying on the curb, aswas certainly very good of them and very honest.
Then Mr. Knight quizzed the three lads, who were none other than Gaines,Pickton and Perth. It appeared, he said, with a sly smile, that Phil Wayand his party had gone away on a trip. Then he asked them about theirown plans, but they knew his friendliness toward the four chums too wellto divulge a great deal. Still, they could not help showing the chagrinthey felt upon learning that the Auto Boys had really departed thepreceding day.
Seeing their ill-humor in the matter the senior partner of theestablishment made various remarks to the effect that none but the mostactive and alert individuals could expect to cope successfully with suchclever chaps as Billy Worth, Phil Way, MacLester and Jones. Indeed, hewas of the opinion, he said, that no one--referring to no person inparticular, of course--but in general, _no one_,--need feel disturbed ifPhil Way and his crowd of fellows did get ahead of him or them; becausePhil and Billy and the others were really exceptionally able men,--infact, quite out of the ordinary with regard to intelligence and goodjudgment.
The whole effect of Mr. Knight's discourse, as he no doubt intended, wasto make Gaines really sour, Pickton's vanity decidedly ruffled andFreddy Perth deeply humiliated, sick at heart and ready to admit that hewas no match for such fellows as Way had gathered about him.
"Oh, come on!" growled Pick, at last, and when a half minute later thethree were again in Gaines' Roadster at the curb outside, he slammed inthe clutch so violently that Soapy just escaped being thrown out. To theAutomobile Club, to the Park Garage,--to all places they considered inthe remotest degree likely to afford information of the direction theAuto Boys had taken, the Trio went.
With furious impatience but still vainly, they hustled from one end ofthe city to another. Repeatedly they drove past Dr. Way's residence, asif to make sure, time after time, that none of the four friends wasabout the green and yellow shed. All they could learn was that the chumshad driven away, their car laden as if they meant to go to the PacificCoast, at least, the preceding afternoon.
"I _thought_ it was funny that only Way and Jones went to the ball game.And they did it just for a blind, too!" said Pickton grimly.
"You thought nothing of the kind!" growled Gaines. "Least if you did,it's a fine time to be telling it!"
"Well, I guess they haven't seen the last of us yet, anyway, eh?" Pickanswered in that way in which he so often knuckled to Soapy's humor,leading that young gentleman on to do the thing he himself most wishedto do.
"I should rather _guess_ they hadn't," Gaines responded, as if the ideaof pursuit were wholly his own,--"I'll show 'em a trick or two yet."
"The first thing is to find out where they are; at least, which way theywent," put in Perth, quietly.
Gaines turned on him angrily. "What's that got to do with it? You leavethat to me!" he said.
And while it would appear that the information Fred mentioned was, underall the circumstances, quite essential and really did have quite a greatdeal to do with the case, that young gentleman made only a wry face inanswer. Soapy did not see him. Quite possibly Perth did not intend thathe should.
In fruitless running from place to place the three boys spent the day.Repeatedly were they on the verge of falling out with one anothercompletely. Only because Pickton bore Gaines' insolence in silence, orturned it aside by some flattering or cajoling remark, did these two geton at all in this time of trouble and disappointment,--the sort of timethat really measures friendships and motives.
Perth was content to have little to say, usually accepting thesuggestions and remarks of the others without comment. He drove the car,for the most part, and as he liked it very much, earnestly hoped theproposed long trip following after the Auto Boys would not be abandoned.
Wednesday came and the Trio, glum and despondent, talked a great deal,again came very near to serious quarreling, and achieved nothing. Andnow the objects of their chiefest interest and the cause of theirchagrin were two days upon their way. But whither?
"'Three stones piled on top of each other to mark the place,'" musedPickton over and over again. "They _think_ they have something great insight, but I'll bet they don't know exactly what, any more than we do.And they think they're so plagued smart! We've just _got_ to take someof the conceit out of 'em."
"That's what!" Soapy Gaines asserted, but rather dubiously.
"Might as well talk in our sleep, for all the good just talk's doing,"Perth was moved at last to say with some asperity; and his views wouldappear to be not far wrong. However, he was called a pessimist, or someother word amounting to the same thing, by Pickton, while Soapy insistedquite violently, "You leave that to me."
The fact that the Auto Boys had disappeared almost as if by magic and ata time when their machine was supposed to be indefinitely laid up forrepairs, Pickton and Gaines were obliged reluctantly to admit.
That their intention of following after the chums looked more and moreridiculous as the hours passed, and they had no notion whatever as tothe direction they should take, was something of which they did not careto be reminded. Yet it is likely that for want of any clue whatever, andtheir inability to find one,--for none of the three was particularlyresourceful,--the Chosen Ones would have been forced to abandon theirscheme at last, but for the merest chance by which some valuableinformation came to them.
Early on Thursday Freddy Perth sat looking over the morning paper whileSoapy and Pick were starting a fresh discussion of the necessity oftaking some of the conceit out of someone, needless to mention whom. Thethree were on the lawn at Perth's home. The Roadster stood at the curb.
MARSHAL MIRED
SAGERSGROVE OFFICIAL PULLED OUT OF SWAMP BY YOUTHS HE PURSUED.
The foregoing headlines came to Fred's notice as he tried to read whilestill following the conversation of his two friends, thread-bare thoughtheir subject now assuredly was. Half mechanically at first, then withlively interest he noted the following:
"Sagersgrove, June--In a light automobile in which they had set out to overtake and arrest four youthful tourists from Lannington who passed through Sagersgrove yesterday, Marshal Wellock and Eli Gouger, the latter a self-appointed detective, plunged over a bank into Cowslip marshes west of here last night. Both were buried to their necks in mire.
"The locality is practically a wilderness and the automobile would have settled beyond recovery in the swamp but for the merest accident of assistance being quickly obtained. The touring party the officers were after had encamped on a ridge of high land a half-mile beyond and responded to the cries for aid. Wellock and Gouger were able to drag themselves out of the marsh and the car of the tourists pulled their automobile out when only the seat remained above mud. Marshal Wellock was saved the necessity of arresting his rescuers for it developed that his suspicion that the youths had stolen their car was unfounded. The four strangers had themselves taken the marsh road by mistake. They were piloted to the State pike by the officers."
Having read this interesting item through twice, the second time veryslowly and thoughtfully, Freddy Perth again listened to the conversationof Pickton and Gaines. They still discussed the possible whereabouts ofthe Auto Boys.
"Seems likely to me that they may hav
e gone west,--away out throughSagersgrove and beyond," observed young Mr. Perth, after a minute ortwo, a self-complacent twinkle in his eye.
"About as likely as a muley cow having horns, eh, Gaines?" Pickanswered.
"Or a--or a dog or anybody else having 'em," Soapy responded, lamely.
"Well, of course I never did know anything about it, and of course youtwo _do_ know all about it. Still, when you get through with all thisstuff you've said over and over ever since Tuesday, till honestly I'msick of hearing it, just read that!"--and Perth held out the newspaper,his finger indicating the important item. There was triumph unlimited inhis manner.
"Aw, let's see!" growled Pickton, doubtingly. Perth's self-satisfiedsmile irritated him. He took the paper and, Soapy peering over hisshoulder, both read the item through.
"Humph! May be them and it may not," was Pick's comment.
"Don't be a hogshead! It's them all right," Gaines answered brusquely."Why, they're two hundred miles away by this time!"
"Yes, sir! And they're headed for the Gold Cup road races atQueensville," put in Perth, quickly. "That's just where that old Statepike goes. I remember seeing the map!"
Reluctantly Pickton admitted that the tourists mentioned in thenewspaper dispatch must be Phil Way's party. Inwardly he denounced hisluck that he himself had not been first to discover the news.Reluctantly, too, he admitted that the four chums were apparently headedfor the Gold Cup automobile races,--a series of road contests over atwenty-six mile course, scheduled for Saturday of the following week.However,--"Don't see, though, what that mystery of the 'three stonespiled up to mark the place,' that they seem to make so much of, has todo with races," he persisted.
"Maybe they're going to have a lunch stand at the track. Maybe theyrented space for it by mail and had three stones piled up so's they'dknow their place when they got there. Just like that bunch, figuring toearn some money!"
This thought, advanced by Soapy, really did that young gentleman credit,he so rarely had an idea of his own. And although Pick declared asboldly as he felt prudent, that the three stones he had heard mentionedso mysteriously had been placed one upon another long years before,which fact he had also heard stated, the former insisted that his ownnotion of the matter was correct.
While in no sense agreeing as to this, Pickton, for reasons of his own,carried the discussion no further. In his own mind was the thought thathe, at least, would find out if the three stones did not mark some spotvastly more important than Soapy pictured. Let Gaines and Perth thinkwhat they might, the main thing was to be starting in pursuit.
"If it's us for Sagersgrove and the old State pike west, we can't movetoo fast," he said. "We can trail them all right from there, and catchthem by Sunday, I'll bet!"
Gaines and Perth gave prompt acquiescence. The Roadster was run to itshome garage at once, and there followed the trying packing and repackingof touring equipment which inexperience always encounters.
Preparations for a hurried departure had been going forward, in ahaphazard way, for a long time. The result was an accumulation of muchbaggage that was not needed, and the utter absence of several items bothdesirable and necessary. Out of such chaos order was brought beforenoon, however, and the three lads separated to meet again at oneo'clock.
Their good-bys were said, their car at last lacked nothing which couldwell be carried on a machine of its type, and the Chosen Trio headedtoward Sagersgrove promptly at the hour named.
"Now burn up the road," quoth Mr. Soapy Gaines; and Perth, at thesteering wheel, answered, "We'll see the Gold Cup races, anyhow."
"Enough more than races, you take it from me," said young Mr. Pickton,grimly, still thinking of--what?
The Auto Boys' Quest Page 6