“Will he go on home?” Bob wondered. “Had I better go back to Al?”
His thought was answered by Griff’s actions. He paused at the gate, seeming to inspect it. He was surprised to find it ajar, Bob decided. He held his place close to the office shadow and watched, as Griff looked around, inside and outside the fence.
Then, as though discovering something, Griff ran out of sight, leaving the gate as he had found it.
Instantly Bob ran across the small open space to the gate. There, in sudden caution, he cuddled his body close to the fence; it had just crossed his mind that Griff might have gone outside in a pretended hurry to draw out any pursuer; he might be hiding, watching!
He was not, however.
The sputter and roar of a motor startled Bob.
“That’s queer,” Bob mused, while he projected his head through the gateway. Almost in the same instant that he saw Griff starting up a motorcycle, Bob saw Griff shut off the motor and trundle the machine away.
“His own motorcycle is broken, since Saturday’s accident,” Bob reflected. “Now he must have brought another one. He meant to ride off in a hurry,” he deduced, “but he decided the noise would startle and warn people, so he’s going further away before he starts up.”
Instantly his own action was decided upon. He streaked back across the yard, around the hangars, to get his own bicycle. Against a speedy motor it would not keep Griff in sight, but it would enable Bob to get over the ground faster, and, if Griff did not go home, Bob meant to pursue him, making careful inquiries as he pedaled. There was only the crossroad for him to take, and Bob could see it from the highway.
In a very short time, and without having been seen by the watchman, Bob was out on the road. The distant sputter of the motorcycle engine and a speeding form passing the junction of the crossroads gave Bob all the information he needed. Without wasting energy in an effort to keep the flying cycle in sight, he pedaled after it.