CHAPTER X

HELD UP

“That’s the way to do it, Bob!” exclaimed Ned.

“I never imagined you were such a plotter,” complimented Jerry. “How’d you come to think of it, Chunky?”

“Oh, it just sort of came to me,” explained the stout lad, as he looked back to see Noddy and his companions leap from their auto, and examine the burst tires. “I figured that after the way Noddy’d been spying on us that he’d try to follow us, so I got ready for him. I thought it out that tire trouble was the easiest for me to bring about, and it would hold him back as well as if it was something else. So I bought the tacks.”

“And made good use of ’em!” chuckled Jerry. “You’re all right, Bob!”

Noddy Nixon straightened up from an examination of his stalled auto. He shook his fist at our friends who were rapidly drawing away.

“I’ll--fix--you--for--this!” yelled the bully in a loud voice.

“Well, you’ll have plenty of time to do it in,” remarked Bob with a laugh. “You’ll have to use new shoes, and inner tubes too, I’m thinking. Speed her up, Jerry.”

“All right,” and the tall lad turned on more gasolene, until the big car was going along at a rapid pace.

“Not too fast,” cautioned Ned. “We don’t want to be taken in for speeding, you know.”

“Not much danger,” returned Jerry. “It’s rather a lonely stretch of country for several miles yet.”

“How do you think he managed to get after us so quickly?” asked Professor Snodgrass, who, wonderful to relate, was neither looking at his specimens, making notes about, nor seeking to capture others. He had been too much interested in the chase and its sudden termination.

“Oh, he must have heard Andy Rush say we were going to Pittsburg,” spoke Jerry, “and he merely came on here ahead of us, by train, while we traveled by boat. Then he simply got his auto ready, and lay in wait for us. But you put a spoke in his wheel, Bob.”

“Two or three,” chuckled Ned.

As they sped on they talked of Noddy, and speculated on what his plan might be in regard to following them.

“It’s all guess work,” declared Jerry. “No matter what we do he may turn up on our trail sooner or later. The only thing to do is to fight him when we see him, be on our guard all the while, and not to worry.”

“I agree with Jerry,” said Uriah Snodgrass. “Now, as long as we’re so far ahead, Jerry, can’t you go a little slower?”

“Why, does the speed make you dizzy?” asked the steersman, for indeed the pace was very rapid.

“No, but I’d like a chance to look for insects on the bushes as we pass. You never can tell when you may come across a rare specimen,” and through his big glasses the professor anxiously scanned the bushes on either side of the highway, for Jerry obligingly slackened the speed of the big car.

“Are we going to sleep in the car or a hotel to-night?” asked Ned, as the afternoon drew to a close, finding them about a hundred miles away from Pittsburg.

“I vote for the car,” spoke Jerry. “We haven’t tried it in some time. Besides, we can do as we please, and won’t have to bother with fixing up, as we would at a hotel.

“Another thing. If we go to a hotel, Noddy may find it out, and he can thus keep closer tabs on our movements. Whereas, if we sleep in the car, on some country road, we can start off before daylight, breakfast when we please, and no one will be any the wiser.”

“All right, the car it is,” agreed Ned. Anything suited the professor.

“Another good point about the car,” said Bob, “is that we can----”

“Eat whenever we want to,” finished Jerry with a laugh.

“I wasn’t going to say so,” retorted Bob. “I was going to say we could sleep better here, for it will be quieter out under the trees than in a hotel.”

“That’s the time he had you, Jerry,” laughed Ned.

“Well, pick out a good place as you go along,” advised the tall lad, “and we’ll pull up there and stop.”

“That hill looks to be in a good location,” suggested Bob, pointing to a rise in the distance. “There is a grove of trees there, and we can pull into them for the night. Speed up, and make it, Jerry.”

The lad at the wheel was about to pull over the gasolene lever, and adjust the spark, when, out from a little country lane, just in front of the auto, leaped a man, with a shining badge on his coat, a club in one hand and a revolver in the other. He held out his arms to obstruct their passage, at the same time crying in loud tones:

“Halt! Hold on there! You can’t go any further! I’m the law, an’ I says so. You’ve got to come with me!”

Jerry looked quickly at the speedometer, and saw that it registered only about six miles per hour. He was glad he had not sent the car racing ahead.

“Come on now! No tricks! Stop that car!” commanded the evident official. “You’ve got to come with me.”

“What for?” asked Jerry. “Not for speeding evidently, for we were going like a snail.”

“I didn’t say nothin’ about no speedin’,” replied the man. “It’s a more serious charge than that. I’ve been on the lookout for ye a long time, an’ I got ye, by heck! Come along!”

By this time Jerry had easily brought the car to a stop not far from the grizzled man.

“What right have you got to stop us?” demanded the young steersman. “Who are you, and what is the charge against us?”

“I’m Constable Enberry Snook,” was the answer, “and this here is my authority,” and he tapped his badge with the club. “I derive my authority from th’ selectmen of Huckleberry Township, an’ these likewise is th’ main instruments that I use,” and he glanced from his club to his revolver, and back at the party in the auto. “Now be ye goin’ t’ come along peaceable like, or have I got t’ use force?”

“But I don’t understand,” said Jerry, while a puzzled look came over the faces of the others. “We haven’t been speeding, and we haven’t assaulted any one that I know of.”

“Of course not!” declared Ned.

“Well, I’ve been instructed t’ arrest ye,” went on Constable Snook, “an’ I’m goin’ t’ do my duty, by heck! Now will ye come along peaceable, or have I got t’----”

He did not finish the sentence, for with a cry that was startling in its suddenness Professor Snodgrass, who had been sitting in front with Jerry, fairly leaped from his seat, and dashed at the constable.

“Don’t move! Don’t stir!” cried the excited scientist. “I’ve got it! It’s on you! Don’t move! I’ve been looking for it ever and ever so long!”

A moment later he had hold of the constable’s coat.

“Here! Let me go! Onhand me! This is treason! Ye’re assaultin’ an officer in th’ performance of his office, an’ it’s ten years’ imprisonment fer that offense. Let me go, I tell ye! Don’t ye dare t’ strike me! I’ve got assistants with me. Help! Help! He’s chokin’ me! He’s chokin’ an officer of th’ law!”

Mr. Snook, dropping both his club and revolver, sought in vain to pull away from the grasp of Professor Snodgrass, and then the constable, finding that the scientist had too firm a hold, pulled out a whistle, and blew a shrill blast. A moment later two men, evidently farmhands, each armed with a pitchfork, leaped out of the bushes at the side of the road.