Sometimes they lost the trail of the maroon car completely; but when they reached the lively little town of Larned they learned that the fugitives had halted at the local garage for gasoline, and that they had left, still following the road toward the coast, but at a moderate pace.
“Half an hour behind them – or thereabout,” exclaimed Mr. Armitage, with satisfaction. “We should be able to pick that up.”
But even as they started from the garage they met with an accident. A forward tire blew out and the car came down with a solid bump on the roadway.
“Now!” cried Mr. Armitage. “Look at this delay! Isn’t it abominable?”
But Mr. Briggs was a man of quick thought. He was observant, too. He spoke to the owner of the garage. There was a good car standing on the floor and it was for hire. In two minutes it had been run out, Henri was at the wheel, and Mr. Armitage and Mr. Briggs in the tonneau of the hired machine.
Dan had expressed his desire to return to Riverdale. It would soon be night, and he and Billy had many chores to do. They were now thirty miles from home, and the boy feared to go farther without permission from his parents.
“And quite right,” Mr. Armitage said. “But hold yourself ready to-morrow, my boy, if we have the good fortune to overtake those fellows in the maroon car. We shall need you for a witness.”
Dan promised and Mr. Briggs, who had consulted with Henri for a moment, said:
“My chauffeur tells me that you are quite able to run our car back to Holliday’s garage at Riverdale. This man here will put on a new tire and you can get back to town easier in my car than on your machine. Do you want to do me that favor?”
Dan’s sparkling eyes and flushed face replied for him before his lips could form the words. It was so decided, and the others got off quickly in the hired auto. Within the hour Dan started the beautiful touring car on the back track, delighted with his charge, and looking forward to nothing more than a pleasant run over familiar roads to his home town.
It was growing dusk, however, long before he reached Riverdale. Indeed he was all of ten miles from the town when he stopped to light his lamps. Before he started the auto again he observed another car bearing down upon him from ahead, its lights blazing in the dusk.
Dan had pulled out to the side of the road and apprehended no danger. But the coming car was braked quickly when a few rods from him, and its driver brought it to a complete stop beside Mr. Briggs’ vehicle.
One of the four men in the machine leaped out and, to Dan’s amazement, stepped into the front of the maroon car beside him.
“Hold up your hands!” commanded this man, in excited tones. “We’ve got you, at least, if your pals have escaped. Hold up your hands!”
Dan shrank back and demanded a reason for threatening him in this savage way.
“You know what I want,” said the man. “You are in the hands of the law. I arrest you, for the robbery of the Farmers’ National Bank at Riverdale!”
CHAPTER IV
BILLY ACTS ON IMPULSE
The sight of Maxey Solomons and his automobile tossed over the embankment and out of view – as a mad bull might toss a dog – frightened Billy Speedwell and his mates; at the moment they did not, like Dan, think of bringing the three men in the maroon motor car to account for their rashness.
With cries of fear they ran along the road to the broken place in the stone wall. Motor car and driver had disappeared over the brink of the chasm. The tops of several trees, the roots of which were embedded in the soil of the river bank, were visible above the wall. The motor car had crashed into these tree-tops; but the boys did not dream, at first, that the branches would stay such a heavy object.
When they came to the break in the stone wall and leaned over it, they saw the drab automobile hanging in the air, not more than twenty feet below the road. It was upside down and it had stuck in the crotched branches of two of the tall trees.
At first they saw nothing of Maxey; but of course, they could not see to the ground at the foot of the fifty-foot precipice over which young Solomons and his automobile had fallen.
“He’s dead!” groaned Monroe Stevens.
“Crushed to death down there – poor chap!” agreed Jim Stetson.
“My goodness!” said Billy. “Who’ll tell his father? The old gentleman will be all broken up. He just about lived for Maxey.”
“And the auto isn’t worth a cent, either,” added Brace Henderson.
At that moment a muffled voice reached their ears, and startled them all.
“Help! Mercy on us – isn’t this dreadful? Help!”
Billy cried his surprise ahead of the others:
“It’s Maxey! He is under the auto!”
They could not see the owner of the wrecked car – not even his legs dangled into view. But Maxey’s voice was unmistakable.
“What you doing down there, Max?” cried Monroe Stevens, loudly. “Why don’t you crawl out?”
“I can’t!” wailed the voice of the hidden youth.
“Why can’t you?” queried Henderson.
“I don’t dare,” admitted Solomons.
All the cushions of the automobile had rattled to the ground. Its driver was clinging to the wheel, or some other stationary fixture, and not being a particularly brave youth, he could only hang on.
“Somebody’s got to help him,” declared Billy.
“But we haven’t a rope,” objected Jim Stetson. “How can we get him up here?”
“Belts, boys!” cried the quick-witted Billy Speedwell. “Buckle ’em together. I can jump into the top of one of those trees, and I’ll carry the line of belts down, fasten it to the tree, and then to Maxey, and swing him off.”
“You’ll fall, Billy,” objected Monroe, who was older and felt himself responsible for Billy’s safety, now that Dan had gone.
“Not a bit of it!” declared Billy. “Come on with the belts.”
There being no better way suggested, the boys followed Billy’s plan. They watched him in some trepidation, however, as he let himself over the broken wall and leaped for a swinging branch of one of the trees into which the automobile had fallen.
He reached a limb directly below Maxey. That young man was clinging – as Billy had supposed – to the steering gear. He was afraid to drop upon the limb where Billy stood. Indeed, had he done so, he would have had no means of balancing himself. Billy Speedwell had kicked off his shoes before descending the tree and he was barely able to keep his equilibrium.
“Catch the end of this belt, Maxey!” he cried.
“Oh, I can’t!”
“I tell you that you’ve got to!”
But, although Maxey was usually easily influenced, Billy could not put pluck into him at this juncture. The younger boy had to finally climb into the overturned automobile, cling with one hand and his feet to the car, and buckle an end of the string of belts around Maxey’s waist.
The rescuer tossed the end of the line of belts to Monroe and Brace Henderson, and they helped Maxey out upon the roadway again. Billy followed, and when the adventure was over not alone Maxey Solomons, but the boys of the Riverdale Club, felt the reaction. The peril threatening the owner of the wrecked automobile had indeed been great.
“I’m afraid your car is done for, Maxey,” said Monroe Stevens, with sympathy.
“I don’t care!” sighed the rich man’s son. “I wouldn’t ride home in it if it was right-side up here in the road. I never want to ride in a motor car again.”
“Pshaw!” said Jim. “Now you’re talking reckless. It’s too bad you’ve got the car in that bad fix.”
“I