The Auto Boys' Quest

by James A. Braden

It was with difficulty that Pickton and Perth prevailed upon Gaines to do as they had originally agreed and look for quarters where they could prepare most of their own meals and so incur no considerable expense. This accomplished, they quite readily found a really desirable place of the character desired. It was a vacant, one-story, white cottage. Adjoining was a more pretentious house, the owner of both of which dwellings was desirous of taking in what money he might while the influx of strangers was on. For the moderate charge of five dollars for the week he gave the Trio the use of the cottage for themselves and permission to run their car into a shed in the rear of his own residence.

The three lads might have been very comfortable—might have fared well in all respects, in the situation presented, had Soapy been the least bit favorably disposed toward "roughing it." With the gasoline camp stove for their cooking, ample bedding, and water and similar accommodations already in the cottage and at their disposal—why, under the same conditions the Auto Boys, or any group of really congenial young fellows, would have lived in a delightfully care-free way!

But Gaines did not like the bare floor and he did not like the absence of such little conveniences as rocking chairs and electric lights. And although Mrs. Gaston, wife of the owner of the property, and a most pleasant, motherly old lady, sent over a mirror, a lamp, a small table and three kitchen chairs for the accommodation of the boys, to say nothing of a jar of canned peaches and a fresh rhubarb pie, Soapy "hoped he wasn't an object of charity just yet awhile."

Or as Mr. Freddy Perth expressed it, he "simply turned up his long, thin nose at the whole shooting match and acted like a beastly cad." Where and how anything remotely similar to a "shooting match" came into the situation may not be exactly clear. No doubt young Mr. Perth knew just what he was talking about; but at any rate the words quoted, it should be understood, were his own.

However, and notwithstanding Mr. Gaines' constantly expressed dissatisfaction, Pick and Fred went ahead with the plan to make the white cottage their headquarters for the week of the races. The location was pleasantly convenient. Only four blocks distant was the main street and the Crown Hotel. Here many of the racing car owners and drivers were staying and here, also, the committee in charge of the contests had its office.

Considerably disgusted with the failure again to find the Auto Boys and out of sorts with himself and everyone else, Gaines went alone to the hotel for his supper on Sunday night. Perth and Pickton enjoyed their evening meal just as much without him, it is possible, at the cottage. And though they attempted nothing more intricate in the culinary art than boiling eggs, toasting bread and making coffee, they supplemented this fare with fruit from the stand down on the corner and so managed very well.

Soapy returned from the hotel to find the cottage uncomfortably cool and Fred and Tom both in bed—because they were tired and because they were warmer there. He sniffed contemptuously as he prepared to follow their example. Growing still more sulky, he requested both his friends to bear in mind who owned the car that brought them there. Even after he was in bed, Gaines felt moved to declare that he didn't care where the Auto Boys were or were not. He meant, he said, to enjoy the races.

He wanted to hear the hotel discussions, see the practice work and all things incident to the contests. So far as he was concerned, he at last concluded, "Worth and that bunch might run and jump off the edge of the earth if they wanted to." Which feat, by the way, had the Auto Boys known they had Mr. Gaines' free and complete permission to perform, they would quite likely have been glad to undertake for his especial accommodation, if for no other reason.

Now, although Mr. Tom Pickton was no better pleased with the temper Gaines displayed than was Mr. Frederick Perth, the two did not themselves become the firmer friends. Being fellow sufferers from Soapy's disagreeable manner, it would have been quite natural that every bond of friendship and sympathy between them should be strengthened. Yet quite the contrary was true.

Pickton more than half believed Perth responsible for the fact that Gaines had not invited him to supper at the hotel. Fred's somewhat inferior clothing, and his general lack of a kind of swaggering style, much affected by Soapy himself, made the latter ashamed to associate with him. In this light, at least, Pickton viewed the matter. He reasoned that Gaines went by himself because to invite one made it necessary that he invite both the others. Thinking thus, he wished fervently that Fred were some place else.