Chapter VI: The Homemade Speeder

What Matt saw was an ordinary hand car equipped with a two-cylinder gasoline engine. Across one end of the car was a bench, tightly bolted to the framework; back of this was a shorter bench for the driver of the queer machine. The king of the motor boys examined the car with a good deal of curiosity. Power was communicated to the rear axle by chain and sprocket. The gasoline tank was under the driver's bench, and he unscrewed the cap and tested the fuel supply by means of a clean twig picked up from the shelf.

"Oh, she's loaded full," wheezed Bunce. "I filled her myself, not more'n ten minutes ago."

"Do you know anything about motors, Bunce?" inquired Matt, giving the mariner a sharp look.

"Ay, that I do--in a way. I can turn on the oil and the spark when I wants to start, an' I can cut 'em off an' jam on the brakes when I wants to stop. That's all ye got to know in runnin' these benzine machines."

"Where does this belong?"

"Track inspector owns it. Grattan an' me borried it." Bunce grinned. "When we're done with the machine, we'll give it back."

"We'll make a picture, pard," grumbled McGlory, "trailin' along with this tinhorn on a stolen speeder."

"Avast, I say!" growled Bunce. "Ye're too free with your jaw tackle. Lend a hand, an' let's get her on the track an' make off. The section gang'll be out purty soon, an' we want to be away afore they see us."

"Sure you do," agreed McGlory sarcastically. "It'll be healthier for my pard and me, too, I reckon, if we're absent when the section men come along. That's why you wanted to make such an early start, eh?"

Without more ado, the motor boys helped Bunce get the speeder down the slope and upon the rails.

"Any trains coming or going at this hour?" asked Matt, with sudden thought.

"Say," jeered McGlory, "it would be fine if we went head on into a local passenger!"

"No trains comin' or goin', mate," said Bunce. "That's another reason for the early start. Want me to run the thing?"

"I'll do the running," answered Matt. "You climb up in front with McGlory."

Bunce and McGlory got on the front bench. Matt "turned the engine over" by running with the speeder for a few steps, then climbed to his seat, and they began laboring up a stiff grade through the ravine.

The road was full of curves, and when it couldn't go around a hill it went over it.

From his talk with Bunce, the night before, Matt had been under the impression that the stolen car was an automobile, and he had made up his mind to return the car to its owner--if the man's name could be learned--after it had been used for running down Philo Grattan. Now, that he had discovered that the car was a track speeder, he was no less resolved to hand it over to the railroad company on the return to Catskill.

The speeder performed fairly well, considering that it must have been knocked together in the company's shops by men whose knowledge of their work was not extensive. A secondhand automobile engine had furnished the motor.

"This isn't so bad," remarked McGlory, as they ducked around the shoulder of a hill, still on the up grade, with the motor fretting and pounding. "A motor ride's a motor ride, whether you're on an aëroplane, or rubber tires, or steel rails."

"This is what they call a joy ride, Joe," called Matt, from the rear. "The owner of the car doesn't know we're out with it. I'll return it to the railroad company when we're through with our morning's work."

"That's you. I hope the railroad company don't find out we've got it before we give it back. Gee, man, how she's workin'!"

"Fine day an' clear weather for fillin' the bill," remarked Bunce. "Did ye come armed, mateys?"

"Sufferin' hold-ups!" exclaimed McGlory. "Did you think for a minute, Bunce, we'd jump into this without being heeled?"

The cowboy, as he spoke, reached behind him and drew a short, wicked-looking six-shooter from his hip pocket.

Bunce recoiled.

"Where'd you get that, Joe?" asked Matt.

"Borrowed it from the hotel clerk."

"Well, put it away. I don't think we're going to need it. If we find Grattan there'll be three of us to take care of him. He's alone, I suppose, Bunce?"

"Sailin' by himself, mate," answered the mariner. "Better le' me take the gun, my hearty," he added, to McGlory.

"Speak to me about that!" scoffed the cowboy. "Why?"

"I'll have to go for'ard when we come close to the place, an' if Philo gets vi'lent, I'll look at him over the gun, an' it'll be soothin'."

"I'm able to soothe him, I reckon, no matter whether you're ahead or behind."

The speeder was making a terrific clatter. Everything rattled--the brake shoes barged against the wheel flanges, the engine rocked on its bed, and the levers jarred in their guides. In order to talk, and make themselves heard, those aboard had to lift their voices.

"Sufferin' Bedlam!" cried McGlory. "It's a wonder Grattan and Bunce were ever able to steal a rattletrap like this and get away with it. We're making more noise than a limited express."

Suddenly the motor gave a flash and a sputter and went out of business. In a twinkling the car lost headway and began sliding back down the grade toward Catskill. Matt threw on the brakes. The rear wheels locked, but still the car continued to slide downward. Shutting off the power, Matt dropped into the roadbed over the back of the bench, cleared the rails at a leap, and wedged one of the wheels with a stone. He had been obliged to work rapidly, for the car was on the move, and going faster and faster, as its weight gathered headway. But the stone sufficed, and the speeder was brought to a standstill.

"What took us aback, like that?" demanded Bunce.

"Too much gasoline," answered Matt, tinkering with the supply pipe, "and I couldn't check it with the lever control."

"This is a great old chug cart," laughed McGlory. "The railroad company ought to have been willing to pay somebody for running away with it. How'd you ever get over this road with it, Bunce?"

"When I came over the road it was downhill," answered the mariner, "an' all I had to do was to keep the craft on her course, an' scud along under bare poles."

"You had to climb a hill before you took the down grade, didn't you?"

"Ay, so I did, but the car came up the hill easy enough."

Matt soon had the valve in the supply pipe adjusted, and all hands had to push in giving the car a start. When they were going, and the engine had taken up its cycle, there followed a wild scramble to get aboard. This was finally accomplished, and once more they were puffing up the hill, but with less pounding than before.

"Say, Bunce," demanded McGlory suddenly, "did you take the speeder off the track and up the slope into those bushes alone?"

"Ay, ay, mate," was the answer. "But I had a rope and tackle to help."

McGlory was convinced that Bunce was wide of the truth, and Matt inclined to the same opinion, although why the mariner wanted to deceive them in such a small matter was difficult to understand.

Presently, to the great relief of the motor boys, the top of the hill was reached. The descent angled downward, around rocky uplifts and through thick timber, so that it was impossible to watch the track in advance for any considerable distance.

The descent, on such a makeshift power car as the speeder, was fraught with greater perils than the climb up the mountain. No power would be necessary, for the car would go fast enough without any added impetus. In order to keep it from going too fast, and jumping the track, the brakes would have to be judiciously used.

"We're off!" cried McGlory, as the speeder began coasting down the grade.

Matt tried out the brakes. They were capable of slackening the pace, but as for stopping the car, no appliance could have done that.

With rear wheels locked, the speeder hurled itself down the mountain, acquiring greater and greater speed as it went. In and out of cuts the car dashed, here and there rumbling over a trestle which gave the passengers fearful glimpses of space below them.

McGlory and Bunce hung to their bench with both hands. There was no talking, now, for all three passengers were holding their breath.

Finally the descent became less steep. As the grade flattened out slowly into something approaching a level, Matt's work with the brakes began to achieve results. By degrees the mad flight of the car commenced to slacken.

"Sharp curve ahead!" sang out McGlory, heaving a deep breath of relief as the car continued to slow down.

Matt saw the sharp turn in the track where it rounded a shoulder of rock. Naturally he could not see around the turn, and he was speculating as to whether their reduced speed would be sufficient to throw the speeder off the rails at the bend, or whether the car would make it safely.

Before his calculations had been brought to an end, the problem was working itself out.

The speeder struck the curve, whirled around it with a shrieking of flanges against the rails, and then there went up a wild yell from McGlory and Bunce.

Directly in front of the car was a tie across the track!

A collision with the tie was inevitable. Matt foresaw it, and clung desperately to his bench.

"Brace yourselves!" he yelled.

The next moment they struck the tie.

The jolt was terrific. Motor Matt was thrown roughly against the seat in front, and Bunce went into the air as though shot from a gun.