“For the land’s sake! Then we should have to walk back,” cried Mrs. Scattergood.
“Oh, no; I have an extra wheel strapped on here, ready to replace any that is injured. There is a jack in the tool box, and the loosening and tightening again of six screws is all that’s necessary to make the change.”
“‘Jack,’ eh?” sniffed the old lady. “I don’t know no more’n nothin’ what that means. The only kind of a ‘Jack’ I know about’s got long ears and brays. And we gotter get back ’fore long, anyway; I got sody-biscuit to bake for supper. Ain’t nothin’ but baker’s bread in the house, and I wouldn’t put a tooth inter that, if I went ’ithout bread as long as the Children of Israel wandered in the desert. How ’Rill kin eat it I don’t see.”
Janice selected a wide place in the road and turned about. The car acted beautifully and they spun along at a fast pace on the return trip. There was no likelihood of their meeting any other vehicle; the woods, save for the bird songs and frogs peeping in the marshy places, were quite silent.
The car was still some distance from the squatters’ cabin when, in shooting around a turn in the forest-masked road, they came upon a lean hound in the path. Janice shut off the power and braked up, as well as sounded a warning on the horn. Mrs. Scattergood screamed and Miss ’Rill likewise cried out.
The dog seemed to make an attempt to get away; but when he leaped for the side of the road, something hauled him back with a jerk and he fell sprawling directly beneath the wheels of the Kremlin car!
One yelp, and it was all over. The poor creature could not have suffered a more sudden, or more painless, death. Janice brought the car to a jarring stop within a few yards.
She paid no attention to Mrs. Scattergood, who was crying: “Drive right on! the poor critter’s dead and you can’t bring him back to life. I don’t see what an ortermobile is for, if ye can’t run away in it when ye git inter trouble.”
Out of the bushes appeared a boy and a girl. The girl was bawling very faithfully, and the boy was all bluster and threats.
“Ye gotter pay for our dawg! Ye gotter pay for our dawg!” he reiterated.