Thus pleasantly encouraged, Soapy had by this time his head and body through the aperture, and was moved, yet loath, to let go his desperate grasp upon the edges of the window's frame. Stupidly he had not advanced feet first and in consequence there was but one chance in a thousand of his being able to alight upon those extremities when he let himself down. However the urgency of the situation as well as his friend's caustic remarks determined him to make the effort and with a subdued groan he pitched forward.
It was only as might be expected, under the circumstances, that when Gaines sought to leap clear of the window and get his feet in under him, he failed—failed wretchedly. His head plunged into a large, and sadly decomposed pumpkin, carried out to the heap of refuse when Mrs. Gouger had cleaned the cellar recently. His hands grasped only the wet, decaying weeds and, unable to steady himself, he rolled on his back amid the cans, the ashes and all that the rank heap contained.
If there was consolation for young Mr. Gaines in the fact that the pumpkin had broken the force of his fall, he expressed it in a weird and peculiar manner, as he struggled out. If he found reason to congratulate himself that, beyond a mixture of pumpkin pulp and seeds upon his face and in his hair, and sundry sorts of decomposed vegetation clinging to his hands and arms and clothing, he was not injured, he did this, likewise, in strangely excited, irritated language.
Perhaps he was thinking of other things than either consolation or congratulations. Nevertheless he let Perth lead him quickly to the car, half-blinded with the juices of the pumpkin in his eyes. Pickton had the engine going, and Soapy was pushed and lifted into his seat with more dispatch than ceremony. Even while Fred climbed up to the rumble the automobile was put under way. Then out of the alley and down the side street it lunged as if Eli Gouger were but a yard behind.
To follow the side streets to the city's outskirts, and avoid every thoroughfare that looked like a principal artery of the town, was Pickton's plan. For some distance he put on great speed, but later heeded Perth's suggestion to go more slowly and so attract less notice. And as even moderate driving would take one from center to circumference of Sagersgrove in no great length of time, the Roadster was well into the country within a quarter of an hour.
But on and on Pickton hurried. Whither he went he cared not, nor looked to see where he might turn to left or right. He wanted only to leave behind as far as possible the pursuers he believed would certainly be coming on.
"We'll be at the south pole sooner than the Queensville race course at this rate," Freddy Perth shouted, at last. "Head down the first likely looking road west. Great guns! Things aren't so desperate as all this!"
Soapy Gaines, still bearing noticeable evidence in his hair and on his clothing of his plunge from the window, but now able to see as usual, vehemently acquiesced in Perth's suggestion.
"Never saw a man lose his head so!" he growled, with reference to Pickton's frantic haste, regardless of direction. "We're after that Phil Way outfit, don't you know it! Catch 'em about next year! Sagersgrove is where we were going to get right behind 'em on the old pike!"
"A few miles west, then on the first thing that looks like a road, due north, and we'll come to the pike," suggested Fred, more pleasantly. "We can't help but recognize it, and the paper said Way's crowd took that route. Keep a-going. If we don't stop for noon we won't have lost much time, after all."