Tom, making a strong effort to appear cool and dignified, leaned forward. His eye caught the tall man’s.
“I’d like to say this,” he roared: “if the city intended the middle of the street to be used as a place for reading newspapers they’d have put a few benches and chairs along it.”
Chuckles of mirth came from the audience.
“Ha, ha! You’ve got ’im goin’,” piped a very youthful citizen.
“Goin’! He’s the one that will be goin’!” roared the man whose life had been saved. “Where’s there a cop? Where’s that officer I saw on the corner a few moments ago?”
“If he hadn’t gone, too,” cried Tom, looking around, “he’d pinch you for disorderly conduct and blocking the highway. Get out of the road. This machine is going to buzz like a sawmill.”
An elderly lady, who disliked everybody that rode in an automobile, declared to a companion that Tom was the most brazen-looking young scamp she had ever seen; and, the fact is, he did not at that moment appear very angelic.
Snorting indignantly, and still somewhat unnerved, Tom threw in the clutch.
He had expected to spend some time scouting around in the center of the city. But this experience caused him to decide that the more quiet streets would do just as well.
“That chap was certainly a grouch,” he murmured, still highly indignant. “But I guess my remark about the benches squelched him.”