“Wait till I get these things back again, and wipe some of this mess from my face and hands,” said the mechanic, “and then we’ll start right up the hill with a push that can do next door to anything.”
“I really believe she’s working better than ever before,” suggested Blake.
“Well, considering what I did in cleaning things up,” grinned Bud, holding out his grimy hands, “that isn’t to be wondered at. She was fairly clogged with dirt. Give me just another minute, boys, and then we’ll be on the jump!”
CHAPTER IV
THE HOLD-UP
“This is something like living,” Blake remarked, after they had easily made the top of the hill, and were coasting down the other side with increased celerity, though Bud apparently did not dare allow full speed for fear lest something would happen to a dilapidated part of the worn machinery, and cause a bad accident.
All of them were pleased. Although much time had been lost, still, with anything like decent luck, they should easily be able to make the camp while the sun still hung above the western horizon. Blake asked for nothing better.
“That scamp in the flivver had nearly an hour’s start of us, boys,” Blake later on observed. “By rights he ought to be ten miles and more ahead of us, I say; but do you know I half thought I caught a glimpse of his car when we came over the top of the last rise, and not so very far away, either.”
“I certainly heard a sound that might have been made by a car dashing across a short bridge ahead, there,” admitted Hugh.
“All of which looks queer to me,” continued Blake. “Do you think, Hugh, he might have held back to see how we came out of that scrape? Would he be figuring on doing something to hold us up on the way?”
“I don’t know,” was the reply of the patrol leader. “All we can do is to keep a good lookout as we go along, and fight shy of breakers. If only Bud can keep that engine going, we’re bound to arrive, some time or other. If that man tries to bother us, he may wish he hadn’t,” and the light that shone in Hugh’s eyes as he said this told how he meant every word.