The Auto Boys' Mystery Part 10

A most pitiable object was Anderson's poor cow. Her head to the ground as if to escape the smoke, a low, frightened bellowing told of her realization of the danger. Forgetful of herself the child was saying, "Oh, poor, good bossy! Oh, poor bossy!"

The small haystack along side the crude, log barn suddenly blazed up. The dull red glow gave place to a white light all through the clearing. It was impossible now that any part of the property could be saved. Anderson and the other man came running to the car.

"It will be a close shave! Can you make it, boys?" cried the one in the golf cap, above the roar of the flames.

"You bet! Be at the lake in no time! We've often carried more'n six,"

yelled Paul excitedly. "Right in here!" and he held the tonneau door open wide. "You in front with Phil, Mr. Anderson!"

Even as Jones followed Mrs. Anderson, the little girl and the golfing man into the tonneau, and slammed the door behind him, the Thirty was under way. Its staunch gears were never before so quickly shifted from low to high. What mattered it if Paul did sit down hard in the strange man's lap? What mattered it if poor Nels, unused to automobiles, was jerked nearly from his seat before he got his great, clumsy legs quite inside?

The raging sea of fire was bordering the trail ahead, and hundreds of little tongues of flames leaped here and there in the parched, dry gra.s.s and weeds in the road itself.

With frightened, staring eyes Paul looked with wonder upon the dreadful flames leaping from one treetop to another. The man beside him was shielding his face from the terrible glare and heat and the woman and little girl clung tightly to each other, the former watching only the child and holding a hand to protect her face. As if dazed and unable to comprehend, Nels Anderson looked always back toward the doomed clearing.

Phil Way alone watched the road ahead. With firm set jaw and straining eyes he looked ever forward through the blinding glare and the billows of smoke that now and again concealed the trail completely. But his hands gripped the wheel with perfect confidence, his foot pressed the accelerator steadily. The gallant car responded. The ground seemed speeding from under its wheels. On and on it flew.

Thus far the fire had raged to the west of the road only. In but a few places had it reached the trees directly beside the trail, pausing there till some fresh gust of wind, or shower of sparks, carried it to the other side.

But now Phil saw before him a spot where on both sides of the road the forest was a flaming furnace. He did not falter. On flew the car. Another moment and it was in the midst of the fire. A hundred yards it ran through the deadly heat, the awful roar and sheets of flame leaping upward and outward till their fiery fingers were all but seizing the brave lad and his pa.s.sengers.

Safely the Thirty ran the fearful gauntlet. There came a shout of praise and admiration from the golfing man, words of thanksgiving from the woman.

The worst was over.

Rapidly, but not so fast as in the direct course of the wind, the fire was reaching out toward Opal Lake. Like a galloping army it came on behind the car, but, barring accident, could never, would never, overtake the swift machine.

Barring accident! Bravely the engine, clutch, gears, springs, axles and wheels had withstood the strain of the terrific speed, the heavy load and the wretched road. Bravely, with every charge of gas, each cylinder delivered generous power.

The car shot down the grade into the small valley where, some distance below, the gravel road came to its abrupt ending. There was a heavy jolt as the front wheels struck the dry bed of the shallow stream.

Anderson, the giant, pitched forward. He might have caught and righted himself quite readily had he had complete use of his hands and arms, long since partially paralyzed; but in his disabled condition he missed the windshield frame he tried to catch, and went partly overboard.

With his left hand Phil Way reached for his falling pa.s.senger, still holding the wheel with his right. He seized poor Anderson just in time, but the great bulk of the fellow drew him partly from his own seat, and pulled the steering wheel sharply round.

Still going at speed, though now on the upward grade, the automobile answered instantly to the call of the steering knuckles--true to its mechanism, perfectly, to the last--answered to the driver's unintended command, and sharply swerved to the right. A large pine stood in its course.

So quickly did the collision occur, so unprepared were any of the automobile's occupants to meet the terrible shock that the escape of all from serious injury was truly miraculous. The outcome must surely have been far worse had the tree been struck squarely head-on. The fact of the fender and right front tire and wheel receiving the heaviest force of the impact lessened the jar, and the car swung around spending broken momentum in the dishing of both rear wheels.

Nels Anderson, pitched far out on the ground, was gathered up cut and bleeding. Mrs. Anderson and the child were bruised but not much hurt.

Phil, Paul and the golfing man suffered no injuries beyond the nervous shock.

Strange as it may seem, Paul Jones spoke not a word. Questioningly he looked at Way.

Phil had been first to help Anderson to his feet. Now leaving him to the care of the others he quickly inspected the damage done to the machine.

The roar of the flames was still just behind. Their blood-red glare cast a twilight glow far ahead through the darkness of the woods.

"She was a mighty good car," said Phil Way, softly, as if to himself, quite as one might speak of some friend who has gone. "A mighty good car!" but at the same moment his gaze took in the flames fast following along the ground and from tree to tree both west and south. Even here the heat and smoke were terrible. The dull red light was everywhere. The very sky seemed ablaze.

"This is most unfortunate. I'm truly sorry for this, boys," spoke the golfing man, very soberly. He too had been hastily investigating the damage.

Though his voice was kind, the speaker irritated Paul Jones exceedingly.

"Wouldn't have happened but for you, and except to send you to prison you aren't worth it, I can tell you that, Mr. Grandall," were the words he thought, but did not utter.

"Might have been worse! We're still a mile from the lake and the fire's just behind us! That's the whole answer," said Phil rapidly. His words were in reply to the stranger's sympathetic expression, but were equally addressed to all. "Right ahead on this trail, then! We've a raft that will hold everyone!"

Rapid movement was necessary. The wind was blowing furiously now. No power on earth could stay the flames that swept ever forward. Their path grew constantly wider.

Both Phil and Paul looked with astonishment to see the stranger, whom they now detested more than ever, seize Anderson's little girl in his arms to carry her; but they were all hastening forward through the crimson light, and clouds of smoke. No more than a glance could the boys exchange.

Many times the two lads looked back. It was fortunate, perhaps, that the rise of the ground soon shut off their view of the prized Thirty. The hungry, sweeping flames came curling, playing, leaping, dancing, roaring on. They reached the car.

Phil remembered, long afterward, that as he stepped out of the automobile for the last time he noticed the speedometer, twisted about so that the light of a lamp shattered and broken, but still burning, fell upon it.

The reading was 5,599 miles--the record of the season.

Safely ahead of the fire the fleeing refugees reached Opal Lake. With a glad shout, though their faces showed deepest anxiety and fear, Billy Worth and Chip Slider received them.

"The raft's all ready! I've made it big enough to float a house! All our provisions are on board, too!" said Billy to Phil, the moment he ran up.

"Where's the car?"

A few words told the story. There was no comment beyond the quick, "Oh!

what an escape!"

The snaky tongues of fire coming on swift, almost, as the wind itself, were but two hundred yards away when the rescuers and rescued embarked upon the raft. Boxes and camp equipage afforded seats. Billy had trimmed a couple of extra long poles with which to move the clumsy craft, and present safety for all was a.s.sured.

The dawn was just breaking. Once out on the water the coming daylight was quite clear despite the smoke that in vast clouds rolled swiftly over, whipped and torn by the wind.

"Thank goodness there's no fire to the north--not yet anyway," said Phil rubbing his face, grimy with smoke and ashes. He was thinking of MacLester and for the information of the Andersons briefly told of Dave's unaccountable disappearance.

"There's a long stretch of pine on the other side," said the stranger, still wearing his golfing cap, by the way. "There are a couple of streams there, though, both of them flowing into the lower end of the lake. If your friend is lost and should remember that, he could follow either one of them and not come out wrong."

Dave was more than merely lost, Paul thought and said so. And, "You know this country pretty well," he added, addressing the former speaker. "You belonged to the Longknives," he went on rather tartly. "It will be the last of the old clubhouse."

"Yes, one blot will be wiped out. It is only too bad that so much that is good must go with it."

Paul glanced at Phil and his eyes also met Billy's. The man's words were puzzling.

"We saw--" Paul began, but a shout interrupted him--

"_There's_ Dave! There's Dave now and some man with him!" yelled Chip Slider suddenly. His voice was like a burst of ecstasy. His eyes scanning the distant sh.o.r.e, he had instantly caught sight of the two hats waved as a signal.

The joy of the three chums, that the fourth member of their almost inseparable quartette was safe and sound, it would take pages to describe.

With the most delighted waving of his own hat, Phil shouted to MacLester about the skiff still moored on the north sh.o.r.e. His voice was lost in the roar of the wind and the flames now sweeping very near the water's edge. By signals, however, he quickly made Dave understand and the latter and the man with him were seen to hurry forward to where the boat was tied.

All the time the golfing man watched MacLester and the person with him keenly. "Impossible!" he muttered at last. "I thought for a moment I knew the old chap your friend seems to have in tow."

But it was not impossible, apparently, for even before MacLester and his chums could exchange greetings, as the skiff drew near, the small, elderly man in the stern of the boat cried: "Oh! 'tis there ye air then, Mr. Beckley! Oh, ho! hurray! I dunno!" A laugh that was equally like a sob accompanied the words, and "Oh, ho! oh, ho! I dunno!" the old fellow cried again and again.

"It's 'Daddy' O'Lear, right from my own home," the golfing man explained briefly.

The three boys again exchanged quick glances. Instantly as he heard the name "Beckley" Phil had remembered the initial B on the shaving cup found in the clubhouse. Was the man trying to carry on a deception even as to his name, and at such a time, his thoughts inquired. No, he quickly decided, there was some mistake.