His father's family car and automobile runabout were both at the hotel garage, and at his disposal. Soon Fred Ripley was speeding away over the country road in the automobile runabout.
As he neared the camp he extinguished the running lights, then went on slowly so as to make no noise. At last he stopped the car.
Gr-r-r-r! came out of the darkness. Faithful Towser was still at his post. He came forward slowly, suspiciously out of the darkness. He may have recognized his enemy, for Towser came close to the car, showing his teeth in an ugly fashion.
Fred lost no time in starting his car forward. "I wish that pup would have the nerve to get in front of the car," he muttered as he drove slowly away from the camp. "What fun it would be to run over the brute! I don't dare to get out of the car while he's on guard. I forgot about him for the time being, though goodness knows I've cause to remember him."
Towser uttered one or two farewell growls. Two hundred yards further on Fred let out the speed in earnest, at the same time switching on the electric running lights.
"I'll come back late to-night," Fred reflected. "I'll leave the machine a little way down the road, and come up here on foot. In the meantime I'll think of some scheme to get square with Dick Prescott and his crowd. I'll hunt up a good stout club, too, and then if that confounded dog is troublesome I'll settle him."
For an hour or more Fred ran the car at random over one country road after another.
"I wonder if that pup ever goes to sleep," he muttered. "I'd really like to know. If I'm going back that way to-night I'd better be turning about, for there is a bad storm coming."
Turning the car, he drove swiftly back again. In about twenty minutes he reached a part of the road directly above the camp.
Overhead the lightning was flashing brightly. Heavy thunder followed each flash. Large drops of rain were falling, but Fred, bent on his evil errand, did not mind. At any rate he was not afraid of lightning. Aided by the flashes he searched along the side of the road until he found a branch of a tree that he shaped into a club with his knife.