He and Billy had bought maps of the states through which they hoped to travel. The course was laid out as a rough triangle, making Compton the starting point and touching two large cities, bringing up finally at Compton again as a finish. The measured distance over the route chosen was exactly a thousand and eight miles.
They knew that they could easily comply with all the demands Mr. Briggs made, and with all the conditions of the race. They had learned by this time the minutest particulars about their car. Either of the Speedwells could have taken the Breton-Melville auto apart and assembled the parts again perfectly.
Among the Riverdale Outing Club members the interest lay in the rivalry between the local cars, more than in the general outcome of the race. There were to be several contestants from the town in the endurance run, but it was generally acknowledged that none of them had much chance—if the result of the run was governed by speed—saving Burton Poole’s car and that of the Speedwell boys.
And the owners of the Breton-Melville car knew that the speed possibilities of their auto was only a part of the game. It would never do to race over the roads at the pace they had come from Karnac Lake at midnight. No machine, no matter how well built, could stand many miles of such work without shaking to pieces.
The boys had gone over the route by map, and planned just where they would halt for their meals and for necessary sleep. They had read accounts of former runs, and knew about what to expect on the road. Although the run was well advertised, there would doubtless be many obstructions on the route, and the weather, of course, could not be arranged to suit the contestants.
The rules were that any contestant could run ten hours in each twenty-four—consecutively, not otherwise; time lost on repairs or stoppages beyond the automobilists’ control, not allowed. The cars were to be started within ten minutes of each other, and their time would be registered at each station. Stoppages for refreshment, or sleep, had to be reported exactly, too.
One week before the starting of the race there were entered sixty-five cars in the endurance test. Then came the drawings, and Dan and Billy found themselves to be forty-eighth on the list. The first car would be started out of the Compton Motordrome at four o’clock in the morning, and, allowing ten minutes for each car to get under way, the Speedwell boys would not be sent out until ten minutes before noon. Their first day’s run, therefore, would end at ten minutes to ten at night.
The rules allowed them to make the nearest station at the end of a day’s run; but any extra time had to be subtracted from the following day’s schedule. It was a much discussed question as to how long it would take the best car to get over the route under Mr. Briggs’ rules; Dan and Billy believed that it would take between four and five days.
“Twenty miles an hour, on an average, will be mighty good time,” Dan said to his brother. “Of course, we read about sixty, and seventy, and eighty and even ninety and more miles an hour, in automobile racing. We’ve traveled at the rate of ninety miles on our motorcycles—for a mile, or so. But that isn’t what counts.”
“Just the same, if a fellow could get ahead and keep his lead—” began Billy.