Dick took it in his hand and turned it over. The stuff was a small black and white check and was lined with gray satin. Stamped in the middle of the lining was the name of the dealer who had sold it:
“Jennings, Haberdasher,
Wilton.”
Wilton was a good-sized town they had passed through about four miles back.
“I thought he belonged around here,” Merriwell said as he rolled up the cap and stuffed it into his pocket. “Look out for a fellow without a hat, alone, in a red car of some sort, Brad. That’s all we’ve got to go by at present, but I shouldn’t wonder if it would be enough.”
He stepped into the car and started the engine, Brad sprang up beside him and they were off.
They had not gone a hundred feet when the black haired youth rushed out of the gate to the middle of the road. His eyes flashed fire, and as he saw the car moving rapidly away from him his mouth moved and twisted convulsively as if he wanted to shout, but could not.
Then, as the touring car disappeared around a turn in the road, he clenched one fist and shook it fiercely in that direction. The next moment he was following it as hard as he could run.
CHAPTER II.
THE COWARD.
With pallid face and nervous, twitching fingers, which his desperate grip on the wheel scarcely served to hide, Brose Stovebridge flew along the high road between Wilton and the Clover Country Club.