[CHAPTER X.]
A SHIFT IN THE SITUATION.
Matt had never done any more rapid-fire thinking than he did then. While Carl and Spangler, carried away by the excitement of the chase, were yelping frantically and throwing themselves around in the tonneau, and while Hank was growling and threatening, Motor Matt was driving mechanically and turning the situation over in his mind.
Pringle, Trymore, Hank, and Spangler were all concerned in the robbery of Tomlinson. Trymore, in some way yet to be explained, must have got hold of the pearls and have tried to get away with them and leave his pals in the lurch.
Hank, Spangler, and Pringle had been trying to get hold of Trymore, and had felled the tree and laid that trap where the road wound around the mountain. Pringle had been left with the horses while Hank and Spangler made their attack on the car; by getting out, as he had done, Trymore had checkmated his pals, had found Pringle and the horses, and the two had made it up between them to hustle away with all the live stock and leave Hank and Spangler tied up with the automobile on the wrong side of the tree.
All this, at least, represented Matt's quick guess at the situation, built upon certain things he knew and others which he took for granted.
Trymore and Pringle had about five minutes' start of the Red Flier; but the motor-car, under Matt's skilful control, was registering fifty miles an hour by the speedometer on the dashboard. If Trymore and Pringle kept to the road, they must surely be overtaken in short order.
Spangler was the first to sight the horsemen.
"Thar they are, by thunder!" he cried, in savage exultation, "we're goin' a dozen feet to their one, an' we'll smash right inter 'em, in half a minit."
"We'll empty the saddles, that's what we'll do!" said Hank, through his teeth. "We'll teach that brace of come-ons to play lame duck with us!"