CHAPTER VI
THE ARREST
After eating supper, and spending the evening at an old-fashioned Southern Inn on the Virginia side of the Potomac River, the two automobile parties started back to Washington.
Barbara and Peter Dillon occupied seats in the car with Harriet and Mr. Meyers, Mrs. Wilson, and two Washington girls who had been members of their party.
As Ruth did not know the roads it was decided that she keep to the rear and follow the car in front of her.
It was a clear moonlight night, and, though the roads were not good, no member of the party dreamed of trouble.
Bab sat next to Charlie Meyers, and her host was in a decidedly sulky temper. For Harriet had grown tired of his devotion, after several hours of it during the afternoon, and was amusing herself with Peter.
No sooner had the two cars sped away from the peaceful shadows of Mt.
Vernon, than Peter began to play Prince Charming to Harriet.
Charlie Meyers did not know what to do. He was a stupid fellow, who expected his money to carry him through everything. He would hardly listen to Barbara's conversation or take the slightest interest in anything she tried to say.
Every time Harriet's gay laugh rang out from the next seat Charlie Meyers would drive his car faster than ever, until it fairly bounded over the rough places in the road.
Several times Mrs. Wilson remonstrated with him. "You are going too fast, Mr. Meyers. It is dark, and I am afraid we shall have an accident if you are not more careful. Please go slower."
For an instant, Mr. Meyers would obey Mrs. Wilson's request to lessen the speed of his car. Then he would dash ahead as though the very furies were after him.
As for Ruth, she had to follow the automobile in front in order to find her way, so it was necessary for her to run her car at the same high speed. Neither Ruth nor her companions knew the pitfalls along the road. Hugh did not keep his automobile in Washington, and, though he had a general idea of the direction they should take, he had never driven along the particular course selected by Mr. Meyers for their return trip.
Ruth felt her face flush with temper as her car shook and plunged along the road. In order to keep within a reasonable distance of the heavier car, she had to put on full power and forge blindly ahead.
Once or twice Ruth called out: "Won't you go a little slower in front, please? I can't find my way along this road at such a swift pace."
But Ruth's voice floated back on the winds and the leading car paid no heed to her.
Then Elmer and Hugh took up the refrain, shouting with all their lung power. They merely wasted their breath. Charlie Meyers either did not hear them or pretended not to do so. He never once turned his head, or asked if those back of him were making a safe journey.
Barbara was furious. She fully realized Ruth's predicament, although she was not in her chum's car. "Please don't get out of sight of Ruth's car, Mr. Meyers," Bab urged her companion. But he paid not the slightest attention to her request.
Bab looked anxiously back over the road. Now and then she could see Mr. A. Bubble's lamps; more often Ruth's car was out of sight. Patience was not Barbara's strong point.
"Harriet," she protested, "Won't you ask Mr. Meyers to slow down so that
Ruth can follow him. He will not pay the least attention to me."
"What is your hurry, Charlie!" asked Harriet, in a most provoking tone. She knew the young fellow was not a gentleman, and that he was showing his anger against her by making them all uncomfortable. But Harriet was in a wicked humor herself, and she would not try to appease their cross host. She was having an extremely pleasant time with Peter Dillon, and really did not realize Ruth's difficulties.
The front car slowed imperceptibly, then hurried on again.
At about half past ten o'clock, Mr. Meyers turned into one of the narrow old-fashioned streets of the town of Alexandria, which is just south-west of Washington. The town was only dimly lighted and the roads made winding turns, so that it was impossible to see any great distance ahead.
Ruth had managed to keep her car going, though she had long since lost her sweet temper, and the others of her party were very angry.
"It serves us right," Hugh Post declared to Ruth. "We ought never to have accepted this fellow's invitation. I knew he wasn't a gentleman, and I know Mr. Hamlin does not wish Harriet to have anything to do with him. Yet, just because the fellow is enormously rich and gives automobile parties, here we have been spending the evening as his guests. Look here, Ruth, do you think I can forget I have enjoyed his hospitality, and punch his head for him when we get back to Washington, for leading you on a chase like this?"
Ruth smiled and shook her head. She was seldom nervous about her automobile after all her experiences as chauffeur. Yet this wild ride at night through towns of which she knew little or nothing, was not exactly her idea of sport.
Mr. Bubble was again outdistanced. As the streets were deserted, Ruth decided to make one more violent spurt in an effort to catch up with the front car. Poor Mr. A. Bubble who had traveled so far with his carload of happy girls was shaking from side to side. But Ruth did not think of danger. Alexandria is a sleepy old Southern town and nearly all its inhabitants were in bed.
"Aren't there any speed regulations in this part of the world, Hugh?"
Ruth suddenly inquired.
But she was too late. At this instant everyone in her car heard a loud shout.
"Hold up there! Stop!" A figure on a bicycle darted out of a dark alley in hot pursuit of them.
"Go it, Ruth!" Hugh whispered. But Ruth shook her head.
"No," she answered. "We must face the music." Ruth put on her stop brake and her car slowed down.
"What do you mean," cried a wrathful voice, "tearing through a peaceful town like this, lickitty-split, as though there were no folks on earth but you. You just come along to the station with me! You'll find out, pretty quick, what twenty-five miles an hour means in this here town."
"Let me explain matters to you," Hugh protested. "It is all a mistake."
"I ain't never arrested anybody for speeding yet that they ain't told me it was just a mistake," fumed the policeman. "But you will git a chance to tell your story to the chief of police. You're just wasting good time talkin' to me. I ain't got a mite of patience with crazy automobilists."
"Don't take us all to the station house, officer!" Hugh pleaded. "Just take me along, and let the rest of the party go on back to Washington. It's awfully late. You surely wouldn't keep these young ladies."
"It's the lady that's a-runnin' the car, ain't it? She's the one that is under arrest," said the policeman obstinately.
Ruth had not spoken since her automobile was stopped.
She had a lump in her throat, caused partly by anger and partly by embarrassment and fright. Then, too, Ruth was wondering what her father would say. In the years she had been running her automobile, over all the thousands of miles she had traveled, Ruth had never before been stopped for breaking the speed laws. She had always promised Mr. Stuart to be careful. And one cannot have followed the fortunes of Ruth Stuart and her friends in their adventures without realizing Ruth's high and fine regard for her word. Yet here were Ruth and her friends about to be taken to jail for breaking the laws of the little Virginia city.
It was small wonder that Ruth found it difficult to speak.
"I will go with the policeman," she assented. "Perhaps he will let you take Mollie and Grace on home."
Of course no one paid the slightest attention to Ruth's ridiculous suggestion. Her friends were not very likely to leave her alone to argue her case before the justice of the peace.
"I say, man, do be reasonable," Hugh urged. He would not give up. "You can hold me in jail all night if you will just let the others go."
"Please don't argue with the policeman, Hugh," Ruth begged. "He is only doing his duty. I am so sorry, Mollie darling, for you and Grace. But I know you won't leave me."
"Oh, we don't mind," the two girls protested. "I suppose we can pay the fine and they will let us go at once."
Hugh said nothing, for he knew that he had only a few dollars in his pocket.
When Ruth's car finally reached the station house it was almost eleven o'clock.
The policeman took the automobile party inside the station. It was bitter cold in the room, for the winter chill had fallen with the close of the December day. The fire had died out in the air-tight iron stove in the room, and Mollie, Ruth and Grace could hardly keep from shivering.
"Well, where is the justice of the peace or whatever man we ought to see about this wretched business?" Hugh demanded.
At last the policeman looked a little apologetic. "I'll get some one to make up a fire for you," he answered. "I have got to go out and wake up the justice to look after your case. It's bed-time and he's home asleep."
"Do you expect us to sit here in this freezing dirty old room half the night while you go around looking up a magistrate?" Hugh demanded, wrathfully.
"I told you I would have the fire built up," the policeman answered sullenly. "But it ain't my fault you got into this trouble. You ought not to have broken the law. We have had about as much trouble with automobilists in this here town as we are willing to stand for. And I might as well tell you, right now, the court will make it pretty hot for you. It may be I can't get the justice to hear your case until to-morrow, and you'll have to stay here all night."
"Stay here all night!" cried the five young people, as they sank down into five hard wooden chairs in utter despair.
"Harriet, have you seen Ruth's automobile?" Bab asked, as Charlie Meyers' car got safely out of Alexandria and started on the road toward Washington.
Harriet and Peter both looked around and strained their eyes in the darkness. But there was no sign of Ruth or her party.
"Don't you think we had better go back a little, Charlie?" Harriet now suggested. "I am afraid you have gotten too far ahead of Ruth for her to follow you."
"What has Miss Stuart got Hugh Post and Elmer Wilson with her for, if they can't show her the way to town?" argued the impolite host of the automobile parties.
"I think Charlie is right, Harriet. I would not worry," interposed Mrs. Wilson, in her soft tones. "Elmer may not have known the road during the early part of our trip, but neither one of the boys is very apt to lose his way between Alexandria and Washington." Mrs. Wilson laughed at the very absurdity of the idea.
Harriet said nothing more, and, although Bab was by no means satisfied, she felt compelled to hold her peace.
"Will you leave me at my house, Charlie?" Mrs. Wilson demanded, as soon as their automobile reached Washington. "I know Harriet expects to make a Welsh rarebit for you at her home, but I am going to ask you to excuse me. I am a good deal older than you children, and I am tired."
When Barbara reached the Hamlin house she hoped ardently to see the familiar lights of her old friend, A. Bubble waiting outside the door. But the street was bare of automobiles.
There was nothing to do but to follow the other young people into the house and take off her hat and coat. But Bab had not the heart to join Harriet in the dining-room where the preparations for making the rarebit were now going on. She lingered forlornly in the hall. Every now and then she would peer anxiously out into the darkness. Still there was no sign of Ruth or any member of her party! Barbara was wretched. She was now convinced that some accident had befallen them.
"Come in, Barbara," called Harriet cheerfully. "The Welsh rarebit is done and it has to be eaten on the instant. I will make another for Ruth's crowd when they get in. They are certainly awfully slow in arriving."
"Harriet!" Barbara's white face appeared at the dining-room door. "I hate to be a nuisance, but I am dreadfully worried about the other girls. I know they would have gotten home by this time if nothing had happened to them."
Poor Barbara had to make a dreadful effort to swallow her pride, for Charlie Meyers had been dreadfully rude to her all afternoon. "Mr. Meyers," she pleaded, "won't you take me back in your car to look for my friends? I simply can't bear the suspense any longer." Barbara's eyes were full of tears.
"Oh, Bab, you are foolish to worry," Harriet protested. "It would not be worth while for you and Mr. Meyers to go back now. You would only pass Ruth on the road. It is nearly midnight."
"I know it is," Bab agreed. "And that is why I am so frightened. Don't you think you could take me to look for them? Please do, Mr. Meyers."
The ill-bred fellow shrugged his shoulders. "What do you take me for, Miss Thurston? I am not going to let my rarebit get cold. There is nothing the matter with your friends. They are likely to be along at any minute."
Barbara did not know what to do. Mr. Hamlin had not yet come in. Yet she must find out what had happened to Ruth, Mollie and Grace. Bab once thought of starting out alone and on foot, back up the long country road, but she gave up the idea as sheer foolishness.
At that moment the grandfather's clock in the hall chimed midnight.
Almost two hours had passed since the two automobiles had entered
Alexandria, and the little town was only eight miles from Washington.
Bab felt she was going to cry before Harriet's guests. She slipped her hand in her pocket to find her handkerchief. As she silently pressed her handkerchief against her trembling lips she smelt a delicate perfume. Something fresh and cool and aromatic touched her face. It was the tiny rose-bud Peter Dillon had presented to her in the garden!
Now Bab had determined never to ask Peter to do her a favor. She felt that, once she returned his pledge to him, he had the same right to ask a favor of her. But what could Barbara do? Her beloved sister and friends had certainly come to grief somewhere. And Bab was helpless to find them alone.
"Mr. Dillon," Bab spoke under her breath, just showing her handkerchief to him with the rose-bud crushed between its damp folds, "won't you help me to find Ruth?" Bab only glanced at the flower with a shy smile. But Peter saw it.
He jumped to his feet, his face flushing.
"Put the flower back, Miss Thurston," he said quietly to Barbara. "You do not need to ask me to help you look for your friends as a favor to you. I am ashamed of myself to have waited until you asked me. Harriet, I am going back to look for your guests."
Harriet, who was also feeling uneasy without being willing to confess it, cheerfully agreed.
"I am going to take your car, Meyers," declared Peter Dillon without saying so much as by your leave.
Bab and Peter Dillon hurried out to the waiting automobile. Both stopped only to take coats and caps from the rack in the hall.
If Peter Dillon wished to make a friend of Barbara Thurston, his prompt response to her plea for help came nearer accomplishing it than anything else in the world. When Peter refused Bab's proffered rose-bud she then determined to do him any favor that she could whenever he might desire to ask it of her.