“Hurrah!” cried Andy the next morning, bursting into the room where the three chums had slept. “Hurrah! It’s a fine day! Rain all stopped—sun shines—sorry to see you fellows go—come again!”
“Take it easy,” advised Jerry. “We’re very much obliged to you, Andy, for providing this fine shelter for us. Wish you were going along.”
“So do I—can’t though—got to stay here another week—help run the farm—maybe I’ll be a farmer some day—whoop!”
In spite of the storm, which had been an unusually severe one, the roads were in fairly good shape. Now and then a stretch would be reached where speed had to be slackened but, by picking their way, the machines were pushed along at a good rate. Huntsville was reached in about two hours, and the boys left their machines in charge of a store keeper while they walked about the town viewing the sights.
There was not much to be seen, and they had come more for the sake of saying they had ridden the distance than from any other reason. Purchasing a few souvenirs for the folks at home, and buying some sandwiches in case they might not find a convenient eating place, the boys prepared for the return trip.
“We’ll take a little different way on our back trip,” said Jerry. “I know a road that goes past a fine waterfall that’s worth seeing.”
The falls were about fifty feet high, and, with the jagged rocks over which the water flowed, and the trees on either side, made a picture well worth beholding.
The boys stopped for half an hour, watching the leaping, falling water, which possessed a peculiar fascination. Then, as they still had most of their trip before them, Jerry suggested they had better start.
They had not yet turned into the road leading to Cresville, from which they had diverged in order to visit the falls, when riding along a rather lonely stretch of the highway, the boys came in sight of a white house, with no other residences near it. As they came opposite a man suddenly ran from the front door. He seemed greatly excited.