“Yeah,” Fallon replied laconically, “but not’s bad as them bulls. The three hadda take it—the driver couldn’t put up no fight. Dippy was bruised too, but not so bad but what he could say no when we told him he could come with us an’ beat his rap. So Barker says not to bother ’cause there wasn’t no time for arguin’ an’ another car might come along.”
“Barker—Frost—” Skippy asked puzzled, “they’re your friends, huh?”
“Friends! I’ll say so! Cheese, ain’t it a friend that gets us away so easy as this? Lissen, kid—it shows how friendly when I’m waitin’ in the cooler this afternoon an’ along comes this Frost an’ he says he gets in by sayin’ he’s my cousin comin’ to say so-long. Then he says how he heard the long stretch they gimme an’ that he don’t think they gimme no break. So then he talks like a Dutch uncle an’ says how he an’ his pal Barker can give us a break. We don’t do nothin’ he says. Him an’ Barker’ll find out somehow what time we’re gonna take the ride to the jug. An’ they do.”
“Oh!” Skippy groaned as the car bumped his head painfully.
“Feelin’ all right, kid?” Fallon asked sympathetically.
“Yeah,” Skippy answered half-heartedly. “It’s just the bumps that make my head ache.”
“We’ll soon be there,” called the sonorous voice which Skippy recognized as Barker’s.
He raised himself painfully from Fallon’s accommodating lap and sat upright in the seat. The Greek named Biff was sitting on his left and on the end of the seat sat his partner Shorty. Both were smiling at him anxiously, particularly Biff who had a rather set mirthfulness in his round face.
Fallon obligingly crowded himself into the other corner of the back seat in order to give Skippy plenty of room. “Anyways, you must be feelin’ a little better wantin’ to sit up,” he said peering over at him. Suddenly he lowered his voice and whispered, “Say, kid, we ain’t gotta worry now ’cause Barker an’ Frost’s gonna see us through an’ how! Look what chances Frost took!”
“What?” Skippy inquired, aware that a feeling of foreboding had taken possession of him.