CHAPTER XX
THE RIDE TO SOMERVILLE
They made their way to the garage, where there was a motorcycle with a side car attached. Josie darted behind the Colonel’s big touring car and in a moment came out as good a little boy as one could wish. She had simply stepped out of her dress, having the boy’s clothes on underneath. Then she put on a pair of big automobile goggles and, pulling a cap down over her sandy hair, made the disguise perfect. Bob put on over his wedding garment a black alpaca dress of goodly proportions, since he was a broad shouldered, powerful youth. Across his manly bosom he folded a spotless white kerchief and under his chin he tied the strings of a huge black satin quilted sunbonnet, first fitting over his smooth brown head a wig composed of many water waves, the kind beloved by a certain type of female.
“All right but your shoes and they are awful,” complained Josie. “I thought you would forget them and brought these. Father always said your feet would give you away quicker than anything else.” Josie produced from the side car a huge pair of list slippers which Bob was loath to put on but which he did, knowing the girl was right. The patent leathers he had on were hardly in keeping with the bombazine dress and the quilted satin bonnet. He surveyed himself with interest, twisting to see his back.
“Put your shoes and hat in your grip, Auntie, and then we are off.” She handed the young man a lumpy, bumpy grip known as a telescope. He climbed into the side car, Josie mounted the motorcycle and in a jiffy they were off, making the usual splutteration of those noisy modes of locomotion.
“The chief is to attend to the station at Dorfield and we are to follow the truck, which is more than likely going over to Somerville. If it goes beyond there we will go beyond also. Of course, you realize the reason we don’t nab the fellows right now is that we are anxious to get the whole bunch and if we can keep up with where these trunks are to be sent we can more than likely get many more of the gang in our net,” explained Josie, putting on more speed as she saw the rear end of a truck making for the open road on the way to Somerville.
“Now I am to hang around and find out where Markle ships the trunks and then I am to find out what the number of the checks is and report to the chief. Is that it?”
“Exactly! You are such a fussy old lady and so full of curiosity, Auntie.”
“Are you going to let the trunks go off?” asked Auntie anxiously.
“We may have to. Then the persons who apply for them at the other end will be nabbed. Of course, Markle will buy tickets and check the trunks and mail the checks to his confederates. More than likely, he will not get on the train himself but just pretend he is going to. I fancy poor old Markle will wish he had taken the train to-night. He may be near the end of his rope. I can’t help feeling kind of sorry for the poor devil.” Josie sighed a little. “Father always felt sorry for the criminals. One can’t help it. He used to say they had just as much feeling as we had and because they had gone wrong did not alter the fact that they had been cunning little babies once and their mothers had no doubt loved them. Perhaps they loved them so much they did not spank them enough and that is the reason they turned out so badly.”
Bob laughed in a voice not at all suitable for a respectable auntie and was admonished by her critical nephew. They soon caught up with the truck and kept a few hundred feet behind them.
“What is that coming up behind us?” Markle asked his companion.
“Nothing but one of those Indians with a side car carrying an old woman and a little boy. I tell you we made a safe getaway and these trunks will be on the Eastern express bound for the metropolis before the wedding guests have sat down to their paté de fois gras.”
It went off quite as Josie had planned. Markle, quietly and in a businesslike manner, bought two tickets to New York as soon as he reached the bustling little station at Somerville, after lifting out the heavy trunks. Josie and her fictitious auntie were near him and heard him ask for the tickets and demand checks for his baggage.
“I’ll get your tickets, Auntie, while you go ’round to the baggage room and see if your trunk has come,” suggested Josie in an audible tone and a manner of a small nephew who was more or less wearied by his female relatives. “But maybe I’d better not buy your ticket until you see whether it is there or not, ’cause I know you won’t get on the train without it. You women won’t go on trips without your duds.”
Bob flounced off with all the dignity he could muster, managing his bombazine with surprising grace. Markle and his companion paid no attention whatsoever to the boy and the old woman, but went on to the baggage room, where they personally superintended putting the checks on their trunks. It took but a moment for Auntie to poke around the piled up trunks in her diligent search for her own dream luggage and take the numbers of the checks.
“Can’t you find it?” asked Josie. “They promised to get it here in time. I don’t see why you don’t go on without it.” But Auntie decided she would wait until the next train. Her decision was made in a husky whine that astonished Josie, for it sounded so exactly like that of a peevish old woman.
Josie watched Markle from the corner of her begoggled eyes. He took from his pocket a stamped, addressed envelope and carefully placed therein the trunk checks; then he sealed it and dropped it in the mail box on the platform. Josie noted a special delivery stamp on it.
“See that those two trunks go on this express,” he said to the baggage master, who was busy sorting luggage for the train that was due in ten minutes. “I will take the next train myself but a drummer likes to find his wares waiting for him at his destination instead of having to wait for them. They are fairly heavy trunks—would you like a lift?” He was handing out good cigars as he spoke, one to the baggage master and one to the porter, whom he tipped generously. “Have another,” he said to the baggage master, taking out several more cigars. The men moved with alacrity, pulling out the two heavy trunks first, determined that the generous donor of cigars and tips should be well served.
“Now we’ll be going,” Markle said to his companion.
Josie darted into the one telephone booth the small station boasted and quickly had Chief Lonsdale on the wire. The chief had been unable to attend the wedding because of this business.
“Chief, this is O’Gorman! Markle and his pal are just leaving Somerville. The trunks are filled with loot from the wedding. We have the check numbers. Trunks are checked to go on this outgoing express to New York. I’ll stop them, of course.”
“Certainly, O’Gorman!”
“Are the men ready to seize Markle before he gets back into Dorfield?”
“All ready!”
“Are they using my plan?”
“Sure! Didn’t I tell you this was your case?”
“Good by, then! Will see you later.”
The truck with Markle and his companion was moving off when Josie finished telephoning. She ran breathless into the baggage room and accosted the man in charge:
“Say, you know that gentleman who left two trunks here to be sent by this train—he says not to send them yet. He believes he will have them go when he goes. You know the ones—booked for New York—No. 82-6573 and 82-6574. Here they are on the platform.”
“All right, Bo! I’ll cart them back in the baggage room,” agreed the baggage master. He patted the cigars in his vest pocket as much as to say that the gentleman deserved anything at his hands.
Auntie was already comfortably ensconced in the side car keeping her eye on the disappearing truck. Josie jumped into the saddle and they started off.
“There is liable to be something doing pretty soon,” Josie confided to Bob. “Would you rather meet it as my aunt or get back into your own character?”
“You mean a rumpus on the road?”
“Yes! Chief Lonsdale has sent out a force to stop the gentlemen of the road.”
“Which character would be the most useful for me to assume?” laughed Bob.
“Well, as a fussy old woman you might astonish them somewhat with your superior strength if that was needed.”
“Then a fussy old woman I shall remain.”
The road between Dorfield and Somerville was smooth and well kept, except for a piece of about one hundred yards midway between the towns. This stretch of road had caused some bad feeling between the citizens of the rival towns, each side declaring it was up to the other to put in repair. It was a low lying bit of country with a small creek winding through it. At times this creek went on a rampage and inundated the road and when it returned to its channel it always left a sticky gummy road bed, the terror of automobilists.
It was an impossible place for two cars to pass and, if they should meet, it was necessary for one of the cars to back out and give the other right of way. This, of course, was the spot chosen by Josie as the proper place to stop Markle and his companion. When she came puffing up with her auntie she found her plans being put to the test. The truck had been stopped by a shabby Ford that seemed to have come to grief. The four men who had been traveling in it had alighted and were aimlessly poking at the machinery. The accident had occurred just around the bend and the truck had come upon them unaware of its being there.
“What’s the matter?” called Markle impatiently. “Can’t you give me room to pass?”
“Can’t budge her,” responded the chauffeur dully. “She’s got some mysterious ailment that I can’t fathom, but I ain’t much of a hand at a car anyhow. Ain’t been running one for long. If I could get her started I’d back out for you, mister, seeing as you should have the right of way, being as you are further in this here swamp than me.”
“I’ll get out,” Markle said to his companion, “and find out what ails them and let them back out. It won’t do for us to lose too much time.”
It was plain to see that he was nervous and impatient, but he held on to himself with wonderful control. The men let him get to the car and look it over.
“Out of gas!” he said with disgust. “Bring over that can and let us fill her up,” he called to his companion. Under the seat of the truck was a five-gallon can of gasoline. Nobody could ever place Felix Markle in the category of the foolish virgins. He never found himself out of oil. The man obeyed and just as he started to open the can Josie and her auntie arrived on the scene.