Bang!
Another report echoed back from the shadowy walls on either side. This time the bullet came close, but it was only a random shot, for at the pace they were running nobody could take careful aim.
The effect of the closely singing bullet was to make Jack lose his nerve utterly. Blindly he plunged forward, not hearing the distant screaming of police whistles and the thunder of nightsticks as they were rapped on the pavements.
The sound of the revolver shots had aroused the police at last. From every direction they came running; but Jack, in a perfect frenzy of fear, knew nothing of all this. He did see, though, that he was coming into a better lighted quarter. A few stores and residences blossomed with lights, and help lay ahead if he could only make it in time.
Behind him he could hear only one set of footfalls now. Two of his pursuers had dropped out of the chase. The boy put forth a supreme effort, but in the very act he met with disaster. He had been running with his head down, and suddenly, just as he gave a last desperate sprint to gain the lighted quarter, he collided, crashingly, with an iron lamp-post. The boy went down as if he had been struck with a club. Fire blazed before his eyes; his senses swam, and then all became black.
It was just at this moment that a big black auto came whirling through the street. In the tonneau sat a stout, prosperous-looking man who, as he saw the sudden accident, started up and ordered his chauffeur to stop. Master and man got out and went over to the recumbent figure, and, as they did so, a hulking form glided off in the shadowy region toward the waterfront.
“The kid’s broke his head without botherin’ me to do it for him,” the man muttered as he slunk off.
“Now then, Marshall,” said the prosperous-looking man, “give me a hand to pick this boy up. Lucky for him that we were coming this way home from Staten Island or he might have lain here all night.”
They stooped over the lad and picked him up. As they did so, the light of a street lamp fell on the pale face. The owner of the car gave a sudden sharp exclamation:
“Gracious goodness! It’s young Ready! How in the world did he come here?”