“We certainly would,” added Blake; “it’s of prime importance that we get along just now, because we’re heading for the mobilization camp, on an important errand, sir. Please oblige us, won’t you?”
He tried to throw all the pathos possible into his application. Hugh thought the man was laughing in his sleeve, so to say. At any rate, he failed to make the first movement toward getting out of his still throbbing car.
As a general thing, motorists are most accommodating toward those in distress. It seems to be a rule of the road that when the signal is given, any one passing by must be adjudged next door to a criminal. A fellow feeling makes all men who drive motors sympathize with one another, for there is no telling just how soon they may themselves be in dire need of the same help.
“Sorry to say I’m in a desperate hurry myself, boys,” snapped the man, between his set teeth. “I’d like to help you, but any delay just now might cost me a big amount in money. I reckon you’ll get her going, some way or other. At the worst, you could let her drop back down the hill. I think there’s a farmhouse up that little dirt road half a mile or so where you could stay over-night. So I’ll have to push along and leave you. Sorry, too, for I’d like to help you.”
With that he once more started along, and the three scouts stared after him struggling under various emotions.
“The mean skunk!” gritted Bud. “I’ll fix my old engine if it takes a leg. Course, he might have shown me a better way, but I’m coming along.”
Blake Merton was shaking his head as though some new thought had taken possession of his mind.
“This means something, I tell you, Hugh!” he burst out with. “It isn’t just one of those accidents that bob up now and then. That chap was chuckling to himself all the while, just because he had come on us stalled here.”
“What’s that?” asked Hugh, somewhat startled by such an assertion. “Why should a stranger care whether a pack of scouts were held up with engine trouble or not?”
“I’ll try and tell you, Hugh,” came the quick reply, as Blake’s eyes snapped. “I didn’t think to mention it before because—well, so many other things chased through my brain, you know. But this is the same fellow I saw talking to Luther Gregory.”