The Mystery at Putnam Hall Part 4

"Don't worry; we'll get there before you do," answered Andy.

Two blankets were arranged as saddles on the runaway team's backs and a few minutes later Andy and Peleg Snuggers started after the carriage.

"Let us catch up to them," cried the acrobatic youth, and urged his steed forward on a gallop.

"Be careful, I tell you!" cried the general utility man. "Be careful!

He'll run away with you!"

But Andy was too light-hearted to pay heed to the warning, and soon he was well in advance of his companion. Then he sighted the carriage in the distance, and urged his horse to greater efforts.

"Whoop-la! Here we come!" he yelled, and set up a great shouting.

"It's Andy!" cried Pepper. "My, but he is riding some!"

"He always was a good one on horseback," said Fred.

"He wants to be careful; that horse is an ugly one," came from Jack. "I heard a man at the dock say he wouldn't own the beast at any price."

Soon Andy ranged up beside the carriage.

"You're too slow for me!" he sang out merrily. "I'll have to go ahead and tell Captain Putnam you are coming."

He slapped the horse on the neck. Hardly had he done so when up came the animal's hind hoofs, almost unseating him. Then the horse made a mad leap forward and started down the highway at top speed.

"My, see him go!"

"He is running away!"

"Andy, look out for yourself!"

"If he throws you he'll kill you!"

So the cries rang out from the carriage as horse and rider sped over the highway leading to Putnam Hall.

Andy paid no attention to what was said. Of a sudden he had his hands full trying to keep on the horse's back. The steed was galloping along with a peculiar motion.

"Whoa! whoa, Jim!" yelled Andy, but Jim paid no attention. He was off for a run and did not care what happened.

The blanket had not been securely fastened and before long it commenced to slip towards the horse's tail. Andy tried to haul it back. His efforts were but partly successful, and with an end of the blanket trailing around one of his hind legs, the steed became more unmanageable than ever.

On and on went horse and rider, until, in the distance, Putnam Hall loomed up. On one side of the highway were the woods lining the lake sh.o.r.e; on the other the broad campus leading to the school and other buildings.

"He'll slow up now," thought Andy. "Unless he bolts right into his stable. If he tries that I'll have to jump for it."

In front of the school building the roadway widened out into several curves. Andy thought Jim would take to one of the curves, but he was mistaken. On kept the steed, directly past the inst.i.tution of learning.

On the campus were a score or more of cadets, who stared in amazement at the sight of the runaway horse with the boy clinging desperately to his back.

"It's Andy Snow!" cried Henry Lee, the captain of Company A.

"So it is," responded Bob Grenwood, the quartermaster of the school battalion. "How in the world did he get on that horse?"

"It's the one that was. .h.i.tched to the carryall," put in Billy Sabine, another cadet. "Something is wrong."

"Let's tell Captain Putnam," said another.

"Whoa! whoa!" yelled Andy, frantically, when he realized that the horse was not going to pa.s.s into the grounds. "Whoa, I say! You've gone far enough!"

The only effect his words had was to make Jim travel a little faster.

Away they went, past the gymnasium and the stables and then along the country road leading to the farms back of the lake.

"Well, if you won't stop, go on," said Andy, presently. "You'll get tired sooner or later, old man. But, remember, you've got to bring me back, no matter how tired you are."

A good half-mile was covered, and then horse and rider reached a sharp turn in the highway. Here the trees were thick and some of the branches hung low.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE YOUNG MAJOR STILL LAY WITH HIS EYES CLOSED

_The Mystery of Putnam Hall._ (Page 19)]

Andy bent down that he might avoid the branches. But he did not get quite low enough. He looked ahead, saw a man standing on one side of the roadway staring in astonishment at him, and the next instant he found himself caught by the throat in a tree-limb and carried off the horse.

Then Jim bounded on riderless, and poor Andy, kicking and thrashing wildly, sprang free of the tree-limb and landed on his shoulder in the roadway.

The man who had seen him coming leaped to one side, and just in the nick of time, for the runaway horse pa.s.sed within a foot of him. The man gasped in astonishment, and for several seconds did not know apparently what to do.

"Looks like he was killed," the man muttered to himself, as he took a few steps forward. Andy had rolled over on his back and lay stretched out, with his eyes closed, very much as poor Jack had been stretched out only a short while before.

The man looked up and down the roadway and saw that n.o.body else was in sight, that part of the highway being but little traveled. Then he came closer to the unconscious boy and bent over him.

"Only stunned, I reckon!" he muttered to himself. "Wonder if he belongs around here?"

As the man bent over Andy he saw the lad's watch dangling from its chain, fastened to a b.u.t.tonhole of the youth's vest. Then his ferret-like eyes caught sight of a fine ruby pin in Andy's necktie.

"He could easily lose that watch on the road, riding like that, and the pin, too," he muttered to himself. "It's a fine chance to make a little haul!"

He straightened up and took another look around. Not a soul was in sight. With dexterous fingers he unfastened the watch and chain and transferred them to his pocket. The stickpin followed. Then he slipped his hand into a vest-pocket and brought out a five-dollar bill and three one-dollar bills.

"Eight dollars!" he muttered. "Not so bad but what it might be worse. I reckon the watch, chain and pin will bring me another twenty or thirty.

Sparrow, you are in luck to-day."

He lingered, wondering if Andy had anything more of value about him. The youth wore a ring with a cameo in it, but it looked tight and hard to get off.

"Might try his other pockets," mused the thief. Then a distant shouting came to his ears.

"Somebody is after him," he muttered. "I reckon it's time I cleared out.

It won't do for me to be seen in this neighborhood."

He looked around for an instant. Then he walked to the roadside, ran in among the trees and bushes, and disappeared from view.