“Why, we’re on the Belleville turnpike, and to my certain knowledge we’re about fifteen miles off the right road for Fairport. I thought that fellow we asked, about sunset, didn’t seem very sure of his directions. He told us wrong–maybe not on purpose–but wrong just the same. Ed, old man, we are lost in a dismal country with night coming on. Please groan and shiver for me, while I think of the proper thing to say. We’re lost!”
“Well, the only thing to do is to go back,” remarked Ed, philosophically. “Come on. Luckily the roads are good.”
“Hark! Some one is coming!” exclaimed Jack, as he heard footfalls on the hard highway. “I’ll ask him. Maybe there’s a short cut to Fairport.”
The figure advanced out of the darkness into the glare of the lights on Jack’s car. Then he exclaimed involuntarily:
“It’s a girl!”
CHAPTER VII
WORRIES
“Where shall we leave our cars?” asked Belle.
“There’s a garage just around the corner from the hotel,” answered Cora. “We can have the man look the machines over, too, and see that there is plenty of gasoline and oil. Then we won’t have to worry.”
The three cars had drawn up in front of the Mansion House at Fairport, following a pleasant run after the sheep episode. Jack and Ed, of course, were not present, and of them more presently. They were having, as Jack might express it, “their own troubles.”