Girl Alone Part 24

"That's just what I did," David grinned rather whitely at her. "I yelled at them to stop, because I had an idea they'd been up to something, since they'd jumped off this car, and I knew Nita had no business on the train, since all you people were sleeping on the lot.

"They were carrying a couple of suitcases that looked suspiciously heavy to me. It flashed over me that Mrs. Bybee, being treasurer of the outfit, must have left a lot of money in her stateroom, and that Nita and this Steve chap had been planning to rob her when Sally and I heard them talking the other night. I started after them, still yelling for them to stop, and Steve turned and fired at me. He missed me, lucky for me, and I kept right on.

"About a hundred yards beyond the end of the train they climbed into a car that was parked on the road that runs alongside the tracks and after telling me goodby with another bullet that missed me, too, Steve had the car started. I was about to give up and start toward Capital City to notify the police when I noticed there was a handcar on the tracks, just where this spur joins the main line.

"I threw the switch and in a minute I had the handcar on the main line and was pumping along after them. The state road parallels the railroad track for about five or six miles, you know, and I could make nearly as good time in my handcar as they could in their flivver, for it's a down grade nearly all the way." He paused, his eyes closing wearily as if every muscle in his body ached with the memory of that terrible ride in the dead of night.

"Better rest awhile, Dave," Pop Bybee suggested gently, bending over the boy to wipe the cold drops of sweat from his forehead.

"No, I'll get it over with," David protested weakly. "There's not much more to tell. They couldn't see me-had no idea I was trailing them in the handcar. But I could keep them in sight because of their headlights.

I guess they'd have got away, though, if a freight train hadn't come along just then and blocked the road. They were just reaching the grade crossing where the state road cuts the railroad tracks when this freight came charging down on us-"

"But you, David!" Sally shuddered, bowing her head on his hand, the fingers of which curled upward weakly to cup her face. "You were on the track. Did the train hit you? Oh!"

"Of course not!" David grinned at her. "I'm here, and I wouldn't have been if the engine had hit the handcar when I was on it. But I'm afraid the railroad company is minus one handcar this morning. The cowcatcher of the freight engine scooped it up and tossed it aside as if it had been a baby's go-cart, but I'd already jumped and was tumbling down the bank into a nice bed of wildflowers.

"Pretty wet after the storm, so I didn't go to sleep. I'd jumped to the other side of the tracks and was hidden from Steve's car while the freight train rolled on. They didn't stop to hold a post-mortem over the handcar. Probably figured a tramp had been b.u.mming a free ride on it and had got his, and good enough for him.

"When the train had pa.s.sed I was waiting by the road for Steve's car. I guess he was pretty badly surprised when I hopped upon the running board and grabbed the steering wheel and swerved the car into a ditch, nearly turning it over. I don't remember much of what happened then, what with Nita screeching and Steve swearing and popping his gun at me. But somehow I managed to get his revolver-didn't know I'd been shot at first-and dragged him out of the car.

"It must have been a pretty good fight, for Nita decided to beat it before it was finished. She started off with one of the suitcases but it was too heavy and she dropped it in the road and lit out. If Nita could dance as well as she can run," David interrupted himself to grin at Bybee, "she'd be a real loss to the outfit."

"Well, Dave, even if Steve did get away with the money, my hat's off to you, boy," and he reached for the hand which Sally was still cuddling jealously.

"Who's telling this?" David demanded, with just a touch of boyish bravado, which made Sally love him better than ever. "He didn't get away. I'm afraid he won't be good for much for a long time. Nita should have stayed to look."

"The money, Dave!" Mrs. Bybee screamed. "You didn't save the money, did you, Dave? Where are you, Winfield Bybee? I'm giving you fair warning!

If he saved that money, I'm going to faint dead away!"

"Then I reckon I'd better not tell you that I did save the money," David grinned at her. "I surely hate to see you faint, ma'am. It isn't so pleasant."

"Dave, you answer me this minute!" the old lady commanded, shaking a skinny finger in his face. "Do you know the outfit'll be stranded if those two crooks did get away with the money? Every cent we had in the world was in that safe! You oughta be ashamed of yourself, teasing an old woman!"

"I did save the money, if that's what they had in the suitcases, Mrs.

Bybee," David answered more seriously.

"Then where is it? What have you done with it? Left it lying in the road?" the showman's wife screeched, her eyes wild in her gray, wrinkled face.

"Now, now, Mother," Bybee soothed her. "If he did, he shan't be blamed.

How could you expect him to walk six or seven miles with two heavy suitcases and his shoulder shot through?"

Sally lifted her face from David's caressing hand and glared at Mrs.

Bybee. "Of course he didn't leave it lying in the road! After risking his life to save it for you? David is the cleverest and bravest man in the world! Don't you know that yet?"

Her eyes dropped then to David's face, softened and glowed with such a divine light of love that the boy's head jerked impulsively upward from the pillow. "Where did you hide it, David darling?"

"Dear little Sally!" he murmured, as he fell back, overcome with dizziness. "She guessed it, sir," he said drowsily, turning his head with an effort to face Bybee. "I knew I couldn't carry it far, so I hid it. The Steve chap was knocked out cold-I suppose they'll have another charge of 'a.s.sault with intent to kill' against me now-so I knew he couldn't see what I was doing.

"I took the two suitcases across the road, holding them in one hand, because by that time my shoulder was bleeding so I was afraid to strain it. There's a farm right at the end of the road. I struck a match and read the name on the mail box nailed to a post on the road. The name's Randall-C. J. Randall, R. F. D. 2. You oughtn't to have any trouble finding the place.

"There wasn't any moon, but the stars were so bright after the storm that I could just make out a barn about a hundred yards from the road. I cut across the cornfield and managed to reach the barn. There wasn't a sound, not even a dog barking, lucky for me, for if I'd been caught with the suitcases I'd have had a fine time explaining how I happened to get them and what I was doing with them. But I had to take that chance."

"Even if the police had caught you with them, I'd never have believed that you robbed Pop Bybee," Sally a.s.sured him, tears slurring her voice, but her eyes shining with pride.

"If you'd seen me robbing the safe, you wouldn't have believed it,"

David said softly, his free arm drawing her down to the berth so that he could kiss her.

There was a rustle of whispering, a giggle or two from the audience crammed into the corridor outside the door. But David and Sally did not mind. The kiss was none the shorter or sweeter because it was witnessed by the carnival family.

"Well, sir," David went on after that unashamed kiss, which had left Sally trembling and radiant, "I got the suitcases into the barn and up a ladder to the hayloft. You'll find them buried under the hay, unless the Randall horses have made a meal off them by this time."

"Glory be to the Lord!" Mrs. Bybee screamed, pounding her husband on the back. "The show'll go on, Winfield! And what are you standing there for?

Hustle right out after them suitcases or I'll go myself! You've got to go yourself, or that farmer Randall will take a pot shot at anybody that goes meddling around his barn."

"All right, Mother, all right!" Bybee protested. "I'll handle it. Don't worry. But I want to thank Dave here for what he's done for the outfit.

Dave-" he began, lifting his voice as if he intended to make an oration.

"Oh, that's all right, Mr. Bybee," David blushed vividly. "We'll just call it square. You didn't turn me over to the police last night, and you've taken Sally and me in and given us work and protected us-"

"I'm going to do more than that, by golly!" Bybee shouted. "I'm going to the district attorney of this burg and tell him the whole yarn! I'll get them charges against you and Sally quashed in less time than it takes to say it! You're a hero, boy, and by golly, I feel like charging admission for the rubes to look at you! The biggest and bravest hero in captivity!

Yes, sir! How's that for a spiel, Gus?" he shouted to the barker.

"Dave don't seem to think it's so grand!" Gus chuckled. "Look at him! A body'd thing he'd been socked in the eye instead of slapped on the back!"

It was true. David was looking so white and sick and his eyes were so filled with embarra.s.sment and distress that Sally was in tears again.

"What's the matter, Dave?" Bybee asked in bewilderment. "I thought you and the kid would be tickled to death to get a clean bill of health from the cops. What's wrong?"

David struggled upon the elbow of his right arm, his white face twitching with a spasm of pain. "I'd be glad to be free of those charges, Mr. Bybee, but I guess we'd better let them stand for a while.

I might get off all right, but-it's Sally. You see, sir, she's not of age, and the state would make her go back to the orphanage. The law in this state makes her answerable to the orphanage till she's eighteen, and it would kill her to go back. I couldn't bear it, either, Mr. Bybee.

Sally and I belong together, and we're going to be married when this trouble blows over." Although he was blushing furiously, his voice was strong and clear, his eyes unwavering as they met the bright, frowning blue eyes of Pop Bybee.

"But man alive," Pop protested, and it was noticeable to both Sally and David that he did not call him "boy" after David's declaration of his intentions toward Sally. "We can't simply hush this whole thing up! You did follow the crooks and take the money away from them! I've got to notify the police that the swag has been recovered."

"Can't you tell them it was all a mistake and call off the case?" David pleaded earnestly.

"And let that Hula-hussy get off Scot-free?" Bybee hooted. "No, siree!

She ain't a member of this family no more, and she'll have to pay for double-crossing me! I was good to that girl! Staked her to cakes and clothes when she joined up, whining she didn't have a cent to her name!

Stringing me all along! Just joined up to learn the lay of the land!

"Besides, we've already put the case in the hands of the police and they've seen the safe for themselves. The sergeant said it was a professional job, all right, as neat a safe-cracking trick as he'd ever seen turned. I couldn't hush it up if I wanted to."

"I'll do what I can for Sally, lie like a gentleman for her, say she never joined up with us, we don't know where she is-anything you like, but I'm afraid you're bound to be the hero of Capital City before you're twenty-four hours older. Too bad, son, but I don't see how it can be helped," he twinkled.

"I don't care a rap about being a hero," David snapped. "The only thing in G.o.d's world I care about is Sally Ford. Listen, Mr. Bybee, tell the police that one of the other boys chased the crooks and took the money away from them. Let Eddie Cobb be the hero! Eddie'd like that, wouldn't you, Eddie?" he sang out to the freckle-faced youngster who was looking on, goggle-eyed, among the crowd that jammed the door of the stateroom.

"Aw, Dave!" Eddie protested, flushing brightly under his freckles.