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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..fcb51d0 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #65914 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/65914) diff --git a/old/65914-0.txt b/old/65914-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index a608c6e..0000000 --- a/old/65914-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,1910 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of Shaming the Speed Limit, by Burt L. Standish - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this eBook. - -Title: Shaming the Speed Limit - -Author: Burt L. Standish - -Release Date: July 24, 2021 [eBook #65914] - -Language: English - -Produced by: Roger Frank and Sue Clark. - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SHAMING THE SPEED LIMIT *** - - - - - -SHAMING THE SPEED LIMIT - -By Burt L. Standish - - - - -CHAPTER I - -A GIRL, A DOG, AND A MAN. - - -When Miss Elizabeth Wiggin settled herself comfortably in the shade -of the spreading oak in Libby’s pasture, she looked forward eagerly -to a pleasant and quiet hour with her book, “Wooed, Won, and -Wedded.” As may be surmised from the title of the book, Miss Wiggin -was romantic. She was likewise just eighteen years of age, and the -daughter of Judge Nathan P. Wiggin, of Greenbush, the village that -could be seen nestling in the valley something like a mile distant -from that hillside oak. - -Miss Wiggin lived in Greenbush, but on pleasant afternoons she had a -habit of wandering away, accompanied only by an aged shepherd dog, -in search of some spot where she could read without fear of -interruption. For her grim old father objected to trashy love -stories, and her ascetic spinster aunt, who had acted as the judge’s -housekeeper since the death of Mrs. Wiggin, held all such fiction in -abhorrence. - -Indeed, the animus of Aunt Sally Wiggin against stories depicting -the ravages wrought by the little god of the bow and arrow was so -extreme that, by consigning such terrible tales to the flames -whenever she found them about the house, she conscientiously did her -best to prevent them from turning the head of her niece. She even -forbade the village news dealer to sell Bessie any more books of -that type. - -In these days, however, it is no easy matter to deprive any one of -the mental pabulum that is desired, and Aunt Sally had set herself a -task that she could not accomplish. Lemuel Dodd, Judge Wiggin’s -hostler and man of all work, red-headed, freckled, and homely as a -slump fence, undeterred by the discouraging fact that his persistent -efforts to make love to Bessie seemed merely to arouse her -amusement, became her secret and faithful ally. Twice a week, at -least, he spent twenty-five cents of his wages for a paper-covered -novel to be smuggled into her possession, and invariably he chose -the ones whose titles seemed to promise that their contents would -come up to Elizabeth’s requirements. - -“There ain’t many single fellers left round this town,” Lemuel told -himself, “and mebbe if she reads enough of them yarns she’ll git so -desprit she’ll have to grab what’s handy. And when she gits the -notion to grab, I’m going to take keer that I’m the handiest thing -in reach.” - -And so, on this sunny September afternoon, Bessie Wiggin was seeking -the shade of the oak in Libby’s pasture, presumably afar from -interruption, and prepared thoroughly to enjoy Lemuel’s latest -contribution. Her face was almost hidden by one of Aunt Sally’s -extremely old-fashioned sunbonnets, which she had hastily taken when -she slipped out of the house with the book. Shep, the old dog, -stretched himself in the short grass at her feet and prepared to go -to sleep comfortably. - -The view from this spot, at a considerable distance from the brown -road that wound, ribbonlike, down into the village, was pleasant to -the eye, but the judge’s daughter lost no time in admiring the -scenery. She was soon absorbed in the pages of her novel. - -So absorbed did she become that she failed to hear the approaching -steps of a somewhat dusty and soiled, but decidedly good-looking, -young man in a brown Norfolk suit, knee-length leather leggings, and -a motoring cap. He was within a few yards of her when he saw her and -stopped. - -“I beg your pardon, madam,” he said, looking down upon the obscuring -sunbonnet. - -She uttered a little startled scream, and looked up, her blue eyes -wide, her red lips parted. A glimpse of the pretty and youthful face -which the sunbonnet had concealed caused the stranger to catch his -breath. - -“Reginald!” exclaimed Miss Wiggin, beholding before her the living -incarnation of the hero of her book just as her fancy had pictured -him. - -“Daphne!” said the young man, thinking of the mythological wood -nymph. - -“Woof!” barked the old dog, awaking and springing up as quickly as -age and rheumatism would allow. - -The stranger backed round to the opposite side of the tree. “Keep -that beast away from me, please,” he begged, in evident -apprehension. - -With a swift sweep of one slender hand, Miss Wiggin thrust back the -sunbonnet, which, held by the loosely knotted ribbons, hung -suspended on her shoulders, exposing a mass of wavy, golden-brown -hair. At the same moment, with remarkable agility and grace, she -half rose and half turned. On her knees, her right hand clasping the -book, the fingers of her left hand lightly touching the ground, her -gaze followed the shrinking young man, who was now fearfully -watching the ominously growling dog. Surely this was unexpected and -disappointing behavior for Reginald, the brave, who—in her -novel—had unhesitatingly faced the most frightful perils for his -lady fair. - -Made suspicious by the actions of the stranger, Shep advanced, -bristling and snapping. As if contemplating instant flight, the -young man gave one hasty look around. The nearest fence was some six -or eight rods away, and it did not promise to stop a ferocious and -angry dog in pursuit of a fleeing fugitive, and there was no other -refuge in sight. - -“Keep that creature away, won’t you?” again entreated the agitated -man, placing the trunk of the tree between himself and the animal. -“I detest dogs!” - -“Oh, Reginald!” sighed Bessie Wiggin in bitter disappointment! - -“Oh, hang it!” exploded the stranger, with shocking violence. “If I -had a gun——” - -Shep charged, barking violently. He meant to stop out of reach of -the man’s feet in case he showed a disposition to kick. But, making -a great leap, the stranger clutched a stout lower limb of the tree, -and swung himself up out of the reach of harm with the most amazing -celerity, the dog snapping at his heels as they receded skyward. - -Perched astride the limb, with his feet drawn up, the refugee shook -his fist at the raging animal, which, inflamed by success, made -another great jump into the air and fell back on the ground, his -age-enfeebled legs collapsing beneath him. - -Still kneeling, the girl burst into a peal of laughter. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -ROMANCE JUSTIFIED. - - -“Go to it!” said the exasperated man in the tree. “Get in your laugh -while the laughing’s good. If your confounded dog had succeeded in -chewing some chunks out of me, I suppose you’d simply have collapsed -with merriment.” - -“Oh, dear!” gasped Miss Wiggin, trying to suppress her mirth. “If -you only realized how ridiculous it is! Old Shep couldn’t hurt a -sick kitten.” - -“Huh!” grunted the stranger skeptically. “Perhaps not, but he -certainly showed a strong desire to plant a few teeth in any part of -my person that he could reach.” - -Miss Wiggin continued to laugh. “It would have to be a _few_ teeth, -as he’s lost almost all that he ever had, and he’s so old that he’s -half deaf and getting blind. That’s why he didn’t warn me that you -were coming. If you hadn’t shown that you were scared, he’d never -have made an offer to touch you.” - -“How was I to know that?” demanded the man on the limb, flushing. -“On such short notice I couldn’t tell whether he was a senile and -harmless old dog or a young and savage one bent on making a meal off -my person.” - -“You’re an awful coward, aren’t you?” asked the girl, rising to her -feet and regarding him with open contempt. - -She was slender, willowy, and graceful. He considered that she was -the prettiest girl he had ever seen, and he wondered how, even with -the sunbonnet hiding her face, he had made the blunder of mistaking -her for a middle-aged woman. He felt his heart thumping queerly. He -also felt his face burning beneath her unmasked disdain. - -“Let me explain,” he pleaded hastily. - -“It isn’t necessary,” she cut him short. “I don’t suppose there are -any Reginalds to be found outside the pages of fiction.” - -“The Daphnes,” he returned, “are myths.” - -She tossed her head. “Besides being a ’fraid cat,” she retorted, -“you’re just about the most impolite person I ever met. What were -you doing prowling around in this field, anyhow?” - -“Being in haste to secure a conveyance to Albion for two gentlemen -whose motor has broken down back yonder on the road, I was making a -short cut to town and avoiding the most of the hill. The gentlemen -must catch the three-forty train at Albion. It is now,” he stated, -balancing himself on the limb and taking out his watch, “seven -minutes past two.” - -“And twenty-three miles to Albion. Your gentlemen will have to -hurry.” - -“They may make it if I can get an automobile in town.” - -Again she laughed. “Automobiles aren’t popular in Greenbush. Peter -Beedy is the only citizen who owns one. He’s been arrested and fined -four times for exceeding the speed limit of eight miles an hour. The -last time that happened he was so mad he swore he’d never start the -machine again, and he had it towed to his barn and stored away.” - -“Thanks for the information. Me for Peter Beedy.” He glanced -downward. Sitting on his haunches and gazing upward with a wistful -eye, Shep was licking his old chops. “If you will be good enough to -call your dog away and keep a firm, restraining hand upon him, I’ll -hit the high spots between here and Mr. Beedy’s domicile.” - -“As long as you’re so completely lacking in sand,” said she, “I’ll -collar Shep and hold him until you get a fair start. But let me warn -you that if you succeed in getting Beedy’s auto you’ll certainly be -pinched and fined if you’re caught driving faster than eight miles -an hour anywhere within the town limits.” - -“It’s always necessary,” was his retort, “first to catch your hare. -If Beedy’s bubble has any speed at all, somebody will be handed a -laugh. When you give the word, I’ll come down.” - -Now it chanced that neither of them had noticed the approach of -Libby’s bull, confined in that same pasture. The bull was ugly, and -resentful of intrusion on its domain. And just as the girl placed -one hand on the dog’s collar the bull charged, with a snort and a -bellow. The man on the limb shouted a warning. The girl screamed and -dodged behind the tree. The dog, seeing the charging beast by -accident, bounded lamely to meet him. And the bull, with one sweep -of his horns, tossed the dog fifteen feet into the air. - -The man in the tree was paralyzed with horror. The disastrous -attempt of the dog to protect his mistress seemed to check the -charging bull for barely a fraction of a second. With glaring eyes, -the beast came on, dashing straight at the terrified girl. - -“The fence!” shouted the man. “Run!” - -Even as he uttered the words he realized what would happen if she -attempted to obey. The infuriated beast would overtake her, toss her -with its horns even as the old dog had been tossed, gore her, -trample the life out of her delicate body. For the briefest fraction -of time, he was sickened by the thought. Then he dropped from the -tree directly in the path of the mad creature. As he dropped, he -snatched the cap from his head. The instant his toes touched the -turf, he sprang to one side. The bull missed him by a foot, and he -struck the animal across the eyes with his cap. - -It seemed like a feeble thing to do, but he had time for nothing -else, and he hoped desperately to turn the attention of the beast -from the girl; hoped somehow, by diverting the creature’s fury to -himself, to give her an opportunity to flee to safety beyond the -fence. - -The girl had circled round the tree, keeping it between herself and -the bull. As the man struck the animal, the latter swerved and -turned with amazing speed, surprised, perhaps, by the appearance of -a second human being on the scene. The stranger waved his arms and -shouted challengingly. The animal accepted the challenge promptly -and charged at him. - -“Oh!” gasped Miss Wiggin. “He’ll be—killed!” - -But, almost with the agility of a capeador, the young man again -leaped aside at precisely the right moment to foil the beast. Again -he struck with his cap, but this time it was impaled on one of the -bull’s horns and torn from his hand. - -Without glancing round at the girl, he cried sharply, commandingly: -“Run for the fence! I’ll keep him busy till you are safe.” - -Bessie Wiggin ran, just as she was ordered to do, although she did -not realize what she was doing until she had almost reached the -fence. Too terrified to look back, she actually sailed over the -barrier almost as a frightened deer might have done, scarcely -touching the top rail, falling safe on the far side amid some -bowlders and bushes, where for a moment she lay panting and -helpless. - -She was aroused by Shep. The faithful old dog had not been killed. -Limping and whining, he had followed her in her flight and dragged -himself through the fence. Still whining plaintively, he was licking -her face. - -With a sobbing cry, she seized the fence and pulled herself to her -feet. Still baiting the bull, the young man was dodging round and -round the tree, the enraged beast making every effort to reach him. -He had kept his word; he had held the attention of the animal while -she escaped; the handsome stranger she had called a coward had taken -this dreadful risk for her. - -Realizing the danger he was in, she called to him wildly: “Oh, look -out—look out! Jump—quick! Run! Do something!” - -He certainly was doing something; in fact, he was an extremely busy -person just then. Again and again he appeared to avoid the rushes of -the bull barely by a hair’s breadth. Each time this happened the -girl’s heart seemed ready to burst with terror. It could not last -long. The snorting, bellowing beast would get him at last. A slight -miscalculation, the slightest slip, and it would all be over. - -Bessie Wiggin grasped a stake of the fence, and tried desperately to -tear it loose, intending to return to the assistance of the stranger -with this weapon. She was the coward, after all! She had run away -and left him to be killed! - -Then she saw him “put over” a bit of strategy on the bull. The -animal had paused for a moment, and turned slowly upon him, pawing -the ground. Instead of placing the tree between himself and danger, -the man planted his back against it, his eyes never leaving the -beast for an instant. - -Waving his hands in gestures of disdain, he taunted the creature. -“Come on, old lumberheels! Wake up and show a little pep! Throw into -high gear and give us some speed. Don’t quit now; the fun’s just -begun. Wake up! Come on!” - -The bull leaped forward like a hurricane. And just as the pale and -horrified girl expected to see the man impaled to the tree, he -slipped deftly behind it. The head of the bull crashed against the -oak, and the animal staggered as if struck by a butcher’s maul. - -The stranger laughed. “That ought to give you a slight headache,” he -said. - -“Run!” cried the girl. “This way—quick! Now’s the time!” - -Dazed, the bull was backing off slowly, shaking his head. Evidently -the man agreed with Bessie that the moment was propitious, for he -turned and raced toward the fence. But the animal had not been -injured nearly as much as one might have supposed, and, seeing his -mocking foe in flight, he plunged in pursuit. - -The stranger was fleet-footed, but the bull was a trifle fleeter. -Just as the runner gathered himself to take the fence with one clean -leap, the beast overtook him. Through the air sailed the man, -propelled by the head and horns of the bull, as well as by the -spring of his own legs. Over the fence in a great curve he came, -crashing head downward amid the rocks and bushes. - -When the young man opened his eyes again, he discovered that his -head was resting in the lap of Miss Bessie Wiggin, who, sobbing -hysterically, was wiping his forehead with a bloodstained -handkerchief. - -He looked up at her and smiled. “Daphne!” he whispered. - -“Reginald!” she cried. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -IT NEVER RAN SMOOTH. - - -“You’re not killed, are you?” she sobbed, trying to stanch the flow -of blood that trickled from a gash at the edge of his hair near his -temple. - -“If I am,” he returned, with a feeble effort to jest, “I don’t know -it yet.” - -“But you’re hurt. You struck on your head.” - -“Probably that saved my life. Solid ivory, you know. I will admit -that I feel a trifle upset, so to speak. No, don’t move—please -don’t! The mere thought of your moving gives me pain.” - -“But I must go for help. You’re wounded.” - -“I am,” he admitted, gazing up into her blue eyes in a manner that -gave her a most peculiar sensation. “Mortally wounded. I fear. I -never was hit so hard in my life, and I am afraid I can’t recover.” - -Again she cried out in apprehension and distress. “Oh, I was afraid -you were done for when that beast caught you!” - -“I am,” was his singularly cheerful acknowledgment; “I’m done for. -I’ve got mine. The jig is up with me.” - -“Is it your arms, your legs? Your ribs—are they smashed? Where do -you feel it most?” - -“Here,” he answered, putting his hand to his heart. “Rut it isn’t my -ribs; it’s something deeper, Daphne.” - -“That isn’t my name; it’s Bessie.” - -“Bessie! Mine’s George. Awfully commonplace, isn’t it? Now, if my -folks had only called me Reginald——” - -“You mustn’t try to talk. I’m sure it’s painful. You must keep -still.” - -“I will if you’ll keep on talking yourself. The sound of your voice -soothes me like the murmuring of a brook. Your eyes are like -springtime violets. The touch of your little hand is as delicious as -a draft of pure water to a person dying of thirst. Now I’ll leave it -to you if a Reginald could beat that speech much.” - -She stiffened and drew back a bit, the color beginning to return to -her pale cheeks. They looked at each other steadily, and the -returning flush covered her face. - -Beyond the fence the victorious bull pawed the ground; from a -vantage of safety the old dog glared through the rails and regarded -the bull with disapproval, but the man and girl paid no attention to -either of them. The girl had turned her gaze toward the distant road -that wound down into the village. - -“I don’t believe you are hurt much,” she said, in a low voice, -which, however, was made unsteady by a queer little throbbing in her -throat. “If you were, you couldn’t talk like that.” - -“It’s because I am that I can talk like that,” he declared. “It’s -the first time I ever talked that way to any one.” - -“Your friends who have to get to Albion,” she murmured; “I’m afraid -they’ll lose their train.” - -“By Jove!” he cried, sitting up suddenly. “I’d clean forgotten -them!” - -“You were fooling me!” she exclaimed, as she started to rise. - -With a groan he fell back. The crimson, oozing from his wound, ran -down across his temple, and in another moment she was again checking -the flow with her handkerchief. His eyes were closed, and she -imagined he had fainted. - -“Oh, dear!” She seemed distraught. “I don’t know what to do! I’ve -got to get help, but if I leave you, you may bleed to death.” - -“Don’t let me bleed to death,” he begged faintly. “Don’t leave -me—Bessie. You mustn’t leave me—as long as I live.” - -It seemed a great effort for him to lift his eyelids, but he looked -at her again, and the appeal in his eyes filled her with a feeling -of desperation. - -“You must have a doctor.” - -“You’re the only doctor I want. You’re the only doctor who can cure -me. If you throw up the case and turn me over to a common pill -slinger, I’ll never get over it.” - -“But I’ve simply got to get help for you somehow. I’ll hurry.” - -“I can’t let you go. I’m an awful coward, you know, and——” - -“You’re nothing of the sort! I’ve never seen anybody as brave as you -are.” - -A tremor ran over his body. At first she thought it was a convulsive -movement of pain, but when it continued she was overcome by the -astounding conviction that he was laughing. Astonishment gave place -to outraged indignation. There was no mistaking the fact that he was -really shaking with laughter that he sought in vain to suppress. She -leaped up, letting him drop back, and stood rigid, filled with -intense resentment. - -“You—you’re making sport of me!” she said, in a low voice that -suddenly had in it something like icy brittleness. “You’ve been -playing on my sympathy! You’re not really hurt—much. It was a very -ungentlemanly thing to do! I hope you have enjoyed yourself!” - -He sat up without much effort. “I give you my word of honor that I -didn’t mean to laugh at you. Perhaps my head is affected a little. -This crack on the bean must be the cause. It really was some bump.” - -“You—you wretch!” she cried, stamping her foot. “I hate you!” - -Her little hands were tightly clenched. She turned away to hide the -tears which welled again into her eyes; but now they were tears of -exasperation, shame, and rage. - -He got quickly to his feet. “Please, Bessie!” he said. “You don’t -understand. Not for the world would I——” - -He stopped short, staring across at the road, down which a touring -car containing two men was speeding toward the village. - -“Great Caesar!” he cried. “There goes the governor! Hitchens must -have got the engine running somehow. They’ll expect to find me in -town.” With all the strength of a good pair of lungs, he shouted, -waving his hands above his head. The automobile sped on. Its -occupants neither saw nor heard him. - -“I guess I’m left for the time being,” he said. “They’ll go ripping -straight through to catch that train at Albion.” - -“They won’t rip through very far,” Miss Wiggin flung at him. -“There’s a trap just outside the village, watched by a deputy -sheriff and two constables. Your old governor will be nabbed and -pulled up before my father, who will soak him with a fine. And I -hope dad soaks him good,” she finished, laughing, and doing so with -a vindictiveness that seemed to afford her untold relief and -satisfaction. - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -THE TRAPPERS. - - -Jeremiah Small, constable of the town of Greenbush, sat on the top -rail of the roadside fence and wedged a load of fine cut into the -bowl of a burned, blackened, odorous corncob pipe, packing it down -with a decidedly dirty thumb. From his perch he could look over the -top of a cluster of low sumacs and keep watch upon a point on the -hillside where the highway wound into view. He could also see, -somewhat nearer, a tall and lonely elm tree, past which the road ran -in a broadside curve. - -“Weeping” Buzzell, another constable, was sitting on the ground in -the shade of the sumacs, leaning against the fence, and occasionally -wiping his red-rimmed and watery eyes with a faded and mussed -bandanna handkerchief. His jaws worked wearily at a quid of tobacco, -the presence of which was further advertised by the unmistakable -stains at the corners of his doleful and flabby mouth. He had chosen -his lowly position for comfort, and because his companion was far -better adapted to the task of outlook. - -“I tell you, ’Miah,” sniffed Buzzell, “this here job is jest about -played out. A dollar-sixty a day ain’t no livin’ pay for a -hard-workin’ man, and that’s all we git outside commissions on the -fines the jedge imposes, and the deputy sheruff gits the biggest -whack at them. We have to be pacified with what comes outer the -little end o’ the horn. Yis-tidday my share was thutty-two cents, -and so fur to-day we ain’t nabbed only one motor-cycle feller who -come through by accident, havin’ got off the road to Damascus. I’m -gittin’ discouraged.” - -Constable Small made a final poke at the pipe bowl, and glanced down -at the complaining individual. “Never knowed you to tackle any job -that you didn’t git discouraged over in a short time, Silas,” he -averred contemptuously. “Gittin’ discouraged is your long suit. -You’ve been discouraged all your life.” - -Buzzell moved his slouching shoulders resentfully. “Mebbe that’s so, -’Miah, but I ain’t never had no luck, like some folks. When I was -swore in as constable and put on this job, there was an av’rage of -eighteen or twenty merchines a day that went through town regardless -of speed regerlations. Business was lively, and I sorter guessed my -luck had turned. But now them there automobile fellers has got wise -and sent out warnin’s and posted notices in all the garrages round -about cautionin’ folks to keep away from Greenbush, and they’re -goin’ round by the way of Damascus or Cherryfield, and leavin’ us to -twiddle our thumbs. My opinion, it’s hurt the town, too; Greenbush -is deader’n a salted herrin’.” - -Small lifted a broganed foot and struck a match on the leg of his -trousers, after which he held it up until his wheezing pipe was lit. - -“Better not go makin’ that kind of talk in the hearin’ of Jedge -Wiggin,” he warned, pulling hard at the rebellious corncob. “If you -done so, he’d tell you what in a hurry, and you’d lose your badge so -quick it’d make your head swim. You know him, Silas. He ain’t got no -use for automobiles nohow, and when he announced that he perposed to -enforce the speed regerlations without fear or favor, he sartainly -meant it. He’d slap a fine onter the President of the United States -if he was to go scootin’ through town faster’n the speed limit -allows.” - -“Mebbe he would,” said Buzzell. “He’s so hard-headed and sot it -would be just like him. Jest because he’s alwus been a hoss owner -and a hoss-man, he’s down on automobiles in gen’ral and ev’rybody -that has anything to do with ’em. I reckon that’s _why_he wants to -be representative to the legislator, he wants to go there to put -through some kind of a bill to restrict the use of them merchines to -certain roads so that the drivers of hosses can have the other roads -to themselves. That’s jest how old-fashioned the jedge is.” - -“Lemme tell you somethin’, Silas,” said Constable Small, taking his -pipe from between his teeth and striking an impressive attitude with -it. “They better let him go. If the jedge don’t git the nomination -from this deestrict, he’ll upset their apple cart as sure as -preachin’. There’ll be three candidates in the primaries, and the -party don’t want Rufe Crockett, for he’s a windbag, a turncoat, and -a flopper, and he’d be beat at the polls, just as he was four year -ago on the ticket of t’other party. But if Jedge Wiggin can’t win, -I’ll bet you a twenty-cent plug of War Hoss he turns his strength -ag’inst Ephraim Glover, of Palmyra, and throws the nomination to -Crockett. This deestrict is the keystone, and if the party loses it, -they’ll most likely lose the whole county. I understand the governor -himself is ruther fretted over the situation, with the primaries -comin’ on next week.” - -“I don’t keer much about politics nohow,” declared Buzzell, wiping -his eyes again. “One party’s bad as t’other, and there ain’t neither -of ’em done nothing for me. Still I s’pose I’m expected to vote for -the jedge jest because I happened to be the most capable man they -could find for this job. Nobody else I know of wanted it. I took it -because it promised to be a purty good thing, not because I’m -partic’ler agin’ automobilists. I’m goin’ to tell you my private -idee: I think Nathan Wiggin’s turned Greenbush into a graveyard by -finin’ ev’rybody ketched goin’ faster’n eight miles in the town -limits. He’s give the place a black eye and set people to dodgin’ -it. He ain’t progressive, that’s ail I got to say.” - -“And if you’ve got any sense left in your noodle you won’t go round -kow-wowing that kind of talk. If you did—— Hey! By gowdy! Here -comes a bubble over the hill! Git up! Git out your ticker and ketch -him when he passes the big elm. He’s hittin’ it up like a streak of -greased quicksilver.” - -There was immediate action in the shade of the sumacs. With a -sniffling grunt, which held something both of protest and eagerness, -Weeping Buzzell heaved himself to his feet, fishing for his watch. -On the fence Jeremiah Small already had his timepiece in hand. His -snaggy teeth gripped the pipestem; his leathery face expressed the -rapacity of the still hunter who has sighted game. - -“Ready, now!” he cried. “Ketch him when I give the word. _Now!_” - -Down the winding road shot the automobile, trailing a cloud of dust -behind it. Besides the driver, a smoothfaced, bespectacled man of -thirty, it contained only one person, a stout, florid, -worried-looking individual in the middle years of life. - -“Careful, Hitchens!” warned the latter, as the man at the wheel made -a turn that barely prevented them from taking to the ditch. “You -know you’re not used to driving. Don’t pile us up.” - -“Don’t worry, sir,” returned the driver reassuringly. “You know -you’ve got to catch that train if you’re going to get to your office -for the conference with the chairman of the State committee. You’ll -have to talk with old Wiggin over the phone. No time to stop in -Greenbush and chin with him now.” - -“We’ve got to pick up the boy in town. He must have got there twenty -minutes ago. We’re liable to meet him starting out after me with a -hired car. Keep your eyes peeled.” - -Around another curve careened the car, and struck the straight, -gentle incline running down into the village. Out from behind the -sumacs dashed the constables, Jeremiah Small planting himself in the -very center of the highway, one hand upflung authoritatively while -the other flipped back his coat and revealed the badge pinned to his -left suspender. Silas Buzzell backed him up, but with a shade more -discretion about blocking the path of the speeding motor car. - -“Stop!” shouted Constable Small. “In the name of the law I command -you!” - -“Hold up!” wheezed Constable Buzzell. “Stop right where ye be!” - -“Pinched!” exclaimed the driver, in disgust and consternation. - -“Don’t stop! Go on!” rasped the florid-faced man at his side. Then -he lifted himself above the glass wind shield, flung up his gloved -hands, and roared: “Clear the road, you idiots! Out of the way! Get -out!” - -Seeing the automobile whizzing straight at him without slackening -speed to any perceptible degree, Jeremiah Small cast his dignity to -the winds and made a leap for safety. Weeping Buzzell backed off the -shoulder of the road, caught his heel, and sat down amid the dusty -grass of the shallow ditch. The car swished past, the stout man -relaxing on the seat, and tore on its way. - -“That’ll cost ye ten dollars more for defyin’ the majesty of the -law!” spluttered Small, shutting his eyes to prevent them from being -filled with the blinding cloud of dust flung over both officers. -“The jedge alwus tucks on an additional ten for that trick. Go it, -you gay birds! The faster you drive, the higher you’ll bounce when -you hit the bumps. Come on, Silas! Deputy Newberry’ll have that gay -pair collared in two shakes of a lamb’s tail.” - -If the defiant autoists fancied they were to escape the clutches of -the speed regulators in that easy manner, they soon realized their -error. Farther on toward the village, running the full width of the -road, were a series of artfully arranged ridges and hollows -calculated to give a severe shaking up to the passengers of any -motor car proceeding at a speed exceeding four or five miles an -hour. - -When this particular car struck those speed-killers, the two -occupants were shot into the air with great violence. Coming down, -the car seemed to meet them coming up, and the second and third -bounces were worse than the first. Indeed, it was little short of -remarkable that the florid-faced passenger succeeded in staying in -the car at all. The driver, clinging desperately to the wheel, had a -better chance, although he found it extremely difficult. And ahead -of them the road undulated for a distance of several rods, like -miniature waves of the sea. - -“Ugh! Woogh! Woosh!” spluttered the older man, clutching wildly at -the bucking car. “What—in—Halifax! Shut her—unk!—down, Hitchens! -Stop her!” - -Hitchens struggled to obey, finally succeeding in throwing the -clutch and jamming on the brake. The wheels, locked, slid with a -grinding sound that meant money in the pocket of some tire -manufacturer, the car bobbed and hobbled over the ragged places, and -the pursuing cloud of dust swooped down over them. When the dust -settled a little and they could catch their breath again, they -beheld a formidable, satisfied-looking man calmly mounting the -right-hand running board. - -“I’m the deputy sheruff of this town,” announced the individual who -had boarded them. “And you are took up for breaking the speed limit -and defyin’ two regler authorized officers of the law.” - - - - -CHAPTER V - -DISPENSING JUSTICE. - - -The driver bristled with indignation. - -“It’s an outrage!” he cried. “We must get to Albion in time to catch -the three-forty train. You can’t stop us.” - -“I’ve stopped ye already,” said Deputy Sheriff Newberry serenely. -“Under the circumstances it don’t become you to tell me what I can’t -do. You’ll be permitted to proceed on your way to Albion after Jedge -Wiggin attends to your case. So you might as well soople down and -take it calm.” - -“But you don’t understand, you don’t know who you’re holding up in -this high-handed fashion. You are interfering with——” - -“Wait, Hitchens!” cut in the other man, giving a glance at his -watch. “Never mind telling him who we are.” - -“’Tain’t necessary,” stated Newberry. “You’ll have to tell the -jedge, anyhow.” - -“How long,” asked the man with the watch, “will it require to get -through with this business so that we may go on. It is most -important that we should get that train.” - -“Wull,” drawled the deputy, “if the jedge is around handy, and he -don’t read you too long a lecture before he slaps on the fine, mebbe -you’ll git started ag’in in half or three-quarters of an hour; -’tain’t likely to be more’n an hour, anyhow.” - -“Half an hour will make us miss the train. Can’t we fix it with -you?” - -“Now take keer, take keer! Don’t you go for to offer no bribes to an -officer of the law. I couldn’t take them nohow,” he added as -Constable Small came hurrying up with Constable Buzzell wheezing and -sniffling at his heels. - -“But,” protested Hitchens, “if you knew who——” - -“Never mind that,” interrupted the older man sharply. “The other -business will have to wait. I have a curiosity to see just how Judge -Wiggin handles cases of this sort.” - -“Your cur’osity,” assured Deputy Sheriff Newberry, swinging open the -tonneau door, “will be satisfied. Git in, boys!” - -When the three men had all piled into the rear of the car the one in -command directed Hitchens to drive straight down the long main -street of the town, and proceeded slowly. - -Their appearance in the village was the signal for various -inhabitants who observed them to grin and wag their heads, making -uncomplimentary and derisive remarks, while a number of small boys, -hooting and laughing, assembled and followed the car as far as -Turner’s grocery, over which, in a bare and sparsely furnished room, -Judge Wiggin dispensed justice by mulcting the unfortunate speeders -who were arraigned before him. A number of idle citizens, who had -been gossiping and swapping stories on the store steps, rose at once -and followed the prisoners, conducted by Newberry and Buzzell, up -the narrow back stairs to the “courtroom.” Jeremiah Small had been -sent to fetch the judge. - -The automobilists were given chairs facing a table which served as a -desk, and an anæmic-looking young man in horn-rimmed spectacles -seated himself at the table and began making out the complaint, -having first questioned Buzzell about the speed which the offenders -had been making when they ran into the trap. - -“Your name?” inquired the clerk, turning to the older man. - -“Put down John Doe,” said the latter, “and Richard Roe,” he added, -nodding toward his companion. “I am the owner of the car. Richard -was driving when we were held up.” - -The younger man gave him a queer look, and leaned closer, whispering -something behind his hand. The answer was a grim smile and a shake -of the head. After slight hesitation, the clerk wrote down the names -as given. - -The sound of heavy steps on the stairs preceded the entrance of -Constable Small, who announced that the judge was out somewhere, but -that Willie Baker and Nubby Snell had been sent scouting to find -him. - -“I never heard of such an outrage!” exploded the intensely annoyed -Hitchens. “Somebody is going to regret this imposition. Time is -valuable to us, and——” - -“Don’t git flustered and fly off the handle, mister,” advised Deputy -Newberry, twisting off a quid of War Horse with his teeth and -stowing it, bulging, into his cheek with a tongue made dexterous by -long practice. “It won’t joggle things along no faster, and I -ca’late you’ll be the one to do the regrettin’ if you go shootin’ -off a lot of loose talk. If you git sassy before the jedge, I warn -ye now that it’ll prob’ly land ye in the caboose. ‘Go slow’ is a -motter it’s best to toiler around here.” - -“Why don’t you tell them something?” persisted Hitchens, again -appealing to his companion. - -“What talking I decide to do will be done to the judge himself,” -said the older man. - -In the course of fifteen minutes Judge Wiggin appeared. He was a -lean and wiry man with a somewhat grim jaw and a steely blue eye. -There was dignity in his manner. He scarcely glanced at the -prisoners as he seated himself at the table opposite the clerk and -adjusted his spectacles to read the complaint. - -“Hats off!” he ordered, rapping with his knuckles. “John Doe and -Richard Roe, by the complaint of a deputy sheriff and two -constables, by the town of Greenbush duly and legally authorized, -you are hereby charged with catawamping a hossless vehicle over a -public highway, lying within the town limits, at a speed of forty -miles an hour, thereby rupturing the law made and provided, and -wantonly and willfully endangering the peace and safety of other -persons who might find it necessary to locomote upon said highway. - -“According to the complaint,” the judge continued, “the -before-mentioned Richard Roe was the driver, and the -before-mentioned John Doe the owner, of said hossless vehicle at the -time of the infraction of said law. That being the fact, the penalty -administered, in case the charge is admitted or proven, will be -applied in full to the person who was engaged in piloting the -juggernaut when you was nabbed. And let me add that in this court, -with the exception of the judge presiding, unnecessary talk is a -luxury, and luxuries add to the high cost of living. A word to the -wise is a seed sown upon good ground that springeth up and beareth -the fruit of economy. Richard Roe, guilty or not guilty?” - -Biting his lip with annoyance, the younger of the two prisoners -started to protest: “It was necessary—er—your honor, that we -should catch the westward-bound train at Albion. If you were aware -who we are, who your petty officers, hiding like highwaymen in -ambush, had ventured to hold up——” - -Again Judge Wiggin’s knuckles smote the desk. “Apparently,” he said, -“my observation regarding the expense of unnecessary talk in this -court failed to sink in, or even to make a dent. No excuse of -private necessity condones infractions of the law. Your careless -remark, as well as the suspicious nature of the names you have -given, leads me to believe that you are pirooting around the country -under false colors, and makes it rather probable that you are old -offenders trying in that way to dodge the extreme penalty the court -might see fit to administer if your real identities was known. I -shall bear this in mind in passing sentence.” - -The grinning spectators tittered guardedly. The older man reached -out and placed a hand on his companion’s knee. - -“You can see that you are simply making matters worse,” he -whispered. “Anything you may say will be used against us. Plead -guilty at once.” - -Squirming and rebellions, Hitchens complied. However, instead of -passing sentence without delay, the judge squared away on his chair, -locked the fingers of his hands before him, and proceeded to read -the culprits a lengthy lecture anent the rights of the common people -upon the highways and the outrageous and criminal manner in which -these rights were disregarded by automobilists in general. - -During this scathing harangue he scarcely looked at either of the -impatient and suffering victims, but kept his gaze fixed, for the -most part, on the rafters above their heads. He was the possessor of -a fluent flow of language, and a somewhat homely native wit that was -keen and stinging; and certain it was that his vituperation was in -no degree delicately barbed. Even the self-restraint of the elder -man was tested to the limit. - -And presently, when the fine of twenty-five dollars and -costs—twenty-eight dollars and thirty cents, all told—had been -inflicted and paid over, the owner of the motor car released the -safety valve. - -“Judge Wiggin,” he said, “I’m compelled to tell you that it has -never been my misfortune to witness a greater farce or a more -ridiculous travesty of justice. You made it absolutely evident that, -from the very beginning, your mind was made up and that you would -impose a fine, regardless of extenuating circumstances. You -practically warned us that any attempt at defense would merely -increase the sum of money you were determined to get out of us. Such -narrow-minded bigotry stamps you as a man unfit to represent this -district in the legislature.” - -Nathan Wiggin bent a grim and steady eye upon him. “And them few -remarks,” he returned placidly, “constitute a clear case of -contempt, for which I shall have to tuck on another twenty-five -dollars, to preserve the dignity of the court. However, considering -the fact that the last time I heard you speak from the stump you -shot off a whole lot of balderdash, for all of which the so-called -intelligent voters of this State saw fit to elect you governor, I’ll -remit the fine. And discretion being the better part of valor, let -me suggest that you bottle up further seething criticism until we -both get outside, where, as man to man, we can tell each other jest -what we think, without mincin’ words.” - - - - -CHAPTER VI - -A DEMONSTRATION POSTPONED. - - -A bombshell, exploding in that room, could hardly have created a -greater sensation. The governor! The governor of the State, arrested -for speeding in the little town of Greenbush, had been fined by -Judge Wiggin, who, as a would-be candidate for the legislature, -required the support and votes in his district of the governor’s own -party! - -Further than that, more extraordinary, more incomprehensible, having -immediately recognized the governor as one of the two offenders, the -judge had dared to reprimand him precisely as if he were an ordinary -citizen; possibly with a trifle more caustic severity. And Nat -Wiggin was altogether too shrewd and long-headed not to realize that -a single word from the chief executive of the State would be almost -certain to blast his political ambitions. - -Nevertheless, a little calm thought would have led Wiggin’s -neighbors there assembled to realize that his fearless action was -precisely what they might have expected of him. Never in his life -had he played the toady, and he was not a person to cringe in the -presence of power and pomp. “Without fear or favor” was his motto, -and, right or wrong, he adhered to it. Hard-headed and obstinate he -might be, but he was not inconsistent. - -The spectators crowded forward on tiptoe, gaping, almost aghast. -Frowning and grim, his face purple with anger, the governor stared -at the judge. Calm and unperturbed as a June morning, the latter -announced that court was adjourned, and rose from his seat. -Trembling with deepest indignation, the governor’s secretary pulled -at his elbow. - -“Come,” urged Hitchens in a low tone, “let’s get out before I lose -control of myself and twist that old lunatic’s nose.” - -“I don’t think you’d better try that, here or elsewhere, under any -provocation,” returned the chief executive. “I’ve a notion he’d take -as much pleasure in fighting as in fining a speeder.” - -They turned toward the stairs, the spectators, still staring -wide-eyed, clattering back to open a lane through which they could -pass. Weeping Buzzell was ahead of them, galvanized into unusual and -amazing activity. - -“Make way for the governor!” he snuffled, waving his arms. - -Down the stairs in advance he stumped, bursting with eagerness to -carry the news to those apathetic townsmen who had not been drawn by -curiosity to the courtroom. Marvelous and incredible was the -swiftness with which that news spread. Small boys carried it, -scurrying. The governor had been nabbed for breaking the speed -limit; Judge Wiggin had reprimanded and fined him. Villagers of both -sexes and all ages came hurrying toward Turner’s store, anxious to -get a glimpse of the notable who had met such summary and impartial -treatment at the hands of the “jedge.” Hitchens saw them assembling. - -“Let’s get out of this hole,” he urged. “All the jays in the town -will be here in less than ten minutes.” He made for the automobile, -which stood in front of the store, headed down the street. - -“We’ve got to find George,” said the governor, following. “It’s odd -he hasn’t shown up. Wonder what’s become of him.” - -As they paused irresolutely beside the motor car the judge, having -issued forth, approached. There was nothing placating or apologetic -in his manner, nor did he wear an offensive, defiant air. - -“Governor,” he said, “if you’d seen fit to notify me by telefone -that business of importance made it necessary for you to go -skihooting through this town, I’d have had the speed limit raised to -fifty miles an hour for the occasion, and the officers keepin’ an -open and clear road for ye. But when you was ketched, and hauled up -before me, same as any other private person, and give a fictitious -name, I figgered there was only one way to handle the case, which -was the same as I’d handle any other. I’m agin’ these here highway -locomotives on principle, and I’d fine the Czar of Roosia if he was -took up for speeding in one within the limits of this town.” - -Something like a faint smile began to play around the corners of the -governor’s mouth. “How many times have you ridden in an automobile, -Judge Wiggin?” he asked. - -“Jest about as many times as you’ve rid on the tail of a comet, -governor. A good, fast-steppin’ hoss suits me.” - -“Exactly. And you’ve driven some fast steppers in your time. No -doubt you’ve driven them through the streets of this town at a much -greater speed than eight miles an hour, thus endangering the lives -of pedestrians and others upon the highways.” - -“Endangerin’ fiddlesticks! I know how to handle hosses, sir. I’ve -broke and trained hundreds of ’em in my day. I know how to guide ’em -and how to stop ’em.” - -“Still you may not realize that an expert driver of a motor car has -far more perfect control over his machine than the driver of a -spirited horse can possibly have over the animal. Likewise, an auto -moving at the same relative speed as a horse attached to a carriage -may be stopped more quickly than the horse. Therefore the machine, -properly handled, is a smaller menace to human safety than a -horse-drawn carriage.” - -“Governor,” said Nathan P. Wiggin, “politeness forbids me to tell -you jest what I think of that statement. Besides, I’ve got my coat -on.” - -“If you’re too prejudiced,” said the governor, “get into this car -with me, and you shall have a demonstration.” Just how this -invitation would have been received at that moment cannot be said. -Through the crowd came a panting, freckled, red-headed young man, -flinging people aside with his long arms. - -“Hey, Jedge Wiggin!” he called chokingly. “Bessie’s gone crazy! Come -home quick!” - -“Whut’s that, Lem Dodd?” cried the judge, snapping round and -grabbing the young man by the shoulder. “My darter—gone crazy? What -d’ye mean?” - -“Jest whut I say,” insisted Lem Dodd chokingly. “She brung a strange -young feller inter the house, and he’s got a crack on his cabeza, -and he keeled over on the parlor sofy, and he looked like he was a -goner, with his eyes shet, and she hollered and flopped on her knees -beside him, and called him ‘Reginal’ and ‘dear,’ and called herself -a murderer, and kissed him right slap on the kisser.” He caught his -breath with a gulping sound of distress. “And when Miss Sally asked -her who he was, she said she didn’t know, and he don’t b’long round -these parts, for I never see him before, and she’s crazy as a June -bug or she’d never do no such thing.” - -“This,” said the judge, “is a case for immejiate investigation. -Under the circumstances, governor, we’ll have to postpone that -demonstration till some future date.” - -Then he set off for his home, a short distance up the street, -accompanied by the agitated and urgent Lemuel Dodd. - - - - -CHAPTER VII - -A NOVICE AT THE WHEEL. - - -The governor and Hitchens made inquiry of the crowd regarding their -missing driver, but no one present seemed to have seen the man. -Presently the governor turned to his secretary. - -“You don’t imagine,” he asked in a low tone, “that the young man who -is injured in Judge Wiggin’s house can be George?” - -“The girl called him Reginald, according to that fellow who brought -word to the judge.” - -“Still, I’ve got a queer notion that it may be the boy. Let’s -investigate.” When they reached Wiggin’s front door, George, a -bandage tied round his head, was just coming out, followed by the -judge, who seemed to be highly disturbed and indignant. - -“I’m all right now, governor,” called the young man reassuringly. “A -disagreeable bull helped me over a fence, and I sort of collapsed -after walking into town.” - -“Governor,” said Nathan Wiggin grimly, “as near as I can find out, -your shuffer climbed a tree to git away from a toothless, half-blind -old shepherd dog, and run like the devil when Libby’s bull took -after him. Then he follered my darter home, and walked right into -the house arter her. Whuther or not he was shammin’ when he flopped -on the sofy with his eyes shet, Bessie was upsot and made a touse -over him. She’s a ruther emotional girl. My sister’s lookin’ after -her now, and I’ve told her what I think of shuffers in gen’ral and -young men that climb trees to get away from dogs without teeth -enough to dent a biscuit.” - -The governor laughed. “There may be an excuse for the young man,” he -said. “He was bitten by a vicious dog when very young, but I don’t -think bulls could scare him much.” He put his arm across the -shoulders of the young man. “Are you sure you’re not hurt much, -George?” - -“Well, not on the head,” was the reply. “But that girl came pretty -near finishing me. She’s a perfect witch, and I——” - -“Such a statement concerning my darter is slanderous, considering -the fuss she made over him,” said Judge Wiggin in deep resentment. -“But I don’t s’pose it’s anything more than could be expected of an -ordinary shuffer.” - -Again the governor laughed in a peculiar way. “Perhaps not,” he -admitted, turning back to the judge. “I’d like to convince you, -however, that my argument about automobiles was right, and, as long -as you prevented me from catching my train after I had spent three -hours persuading Ephraim Glover, of Palmyra, to withdraw and not -contest you in the primaries, I think it is up to you to give me the -chance.” - -First Nathan Wiggin looked astonished, and then slowly his face -turned red. - -“Was that whut brought you inter these parts?” he asked. - -“That was the principal business. Glover was so hard to handle that -I was delayed until it was only possible for me to get back by train -in time for an important meeting to-night.” Judge Wiggin’s -embarrassment was painful. “Governor,” he said, “circumstances alter -cases. I’m ruther sorry circumstances interfered with that important -app’intment of yours. But whinin’ never stopped a blister from -smarting, and it’s too late to dodge after you’ve been jabbed by the -business end of a hornet. Although I’ve said I’d never set foot in -one of them gas-wagon contraptions, considering who’s invited me, if -you’ll agree to proceed circumspect and decorous within the town -limits, and promise to land me back here safe and sound, I’m going -to take you up.” - -“Done,” accepted Governor Bradley. “Come along, judge.” - -Back to Turner’s grocery, where the bigger part of the curious -crowds still hovered around the touring car, they went, the governor -walking arm in arm with Nathan Wiggin, greatly to the wonderment of -the staring throng. - -“I want you to sit on the forward seat so that you can watch the -driver operate the car, judge,” said the governor, opening one of -the forward doors. “Get in!” - -The incredulous and bewildered spectators gasped when the judge -complied without a murmur to this invitation. Lem Dodd had said that -Bessie Wiggin had gone crazy, and now it seemed that Bessie’s father -was ready for a padded cell. - -“Wull, what d’ye think o’ that?” mumbled old Abner Nutter, poking -his thumb into the ribs of Joshua Philbrook. “The jedge—goin’ -bubble ridin’ arter he’s swore a hundred times that there wasn’t -money enough in the United States treasury to hire him to set in one -o’ them berjiggered things. I’ve heerd him say it with my own two -ears.” - -“They’ve hippynotized him,” was Philbrook’s opinion. “Nothin’ else -explains it. He ain’t in his right mind.” - -“Perhaps you’d better let Hitchens drive, George,” said the -governor, addressing the injured young man. “I declare, you’re pale! -Sure you’re not badly hurt?” - -“Somehow walking makes me dizzy,” was the answer. “Still, I’m -feeling better. I think I’ll step into this store and get a drink of -water.” - -Having become suddenly anxious, the chief executive followed him -into the store. Hitchens, fretful and none too well pleased with the -governor for wasting so much time on Wiggin, left the latter sitting -in the car and mounted the store steps. - -Aware that the accusing eyes of his fellow townsmen were upon him, -Nathan Wiggin gave his attention to the mechanism of the car as -displayed before him. He examined the levers and pedals, squinted at -the clock and the speedometer and the gasoline gauge. He wondered at -the numerous contrivances of push buttons and small levers on the -dash. He even bent forward and curiously moved one of the latter -from one side to the other. About that time a bold urchin who had -climbed on the running board released the emergency brake. - -It was a cry of warning from somebody in the crowd that made Judge -Wiggin aware that the car was moving. It had been standing on a -gentle incline, with its nose pointing down the long main street, -and had started as soon as the brake was set free. - -“Hey!” shouted an excited voice. “She’s goin’! Jump, jedge!” - -Nathan Wiggin did not jump. He was not greatly alarmed at first. The -thing had barely started; it was not running away. He had broken and -trained vicious horses that other men could do nothing with, some of -them veritable man-killers, and surely he could stop an inanimate -contrivance like a motor car, especially when it was not under -power. Possibly he was restrained also by a conviction that he could -not abandon the car with dignity, and by the knowledge that to -abandon it at all under such circumstances would possibly make him -an object of ridicule. He knew with what keen gusto the Greenbushers -“harped on a joke” and nagged the victim thereof. - -“Whoa!” said the judge, moving quickly over into the driver’s seat -and grasping the wheel. “Whoa back!” - -The car moved on, those persons who had been in front of it hastily -scrambling out of the way. The judge braced hard with one foot -against the clutch pedal, but that did not seem to have any effect. -He grabbed one of the levers, thinking it might be the brake, and -gave it a yank. It was the lever that manipulated the gears. At the -same time his foot slipped off the clutch pedal. - -Thrown into gear, the moving car cranked itself, and the engine -leaped to life with a sudden vibrating hum. For in shifting the tiny -lever on the dash Judge Wiggin had made connections with the -magneto. The surprised man gasped as the machine gave a sudden -forward lunge, like a horse beneath the stinging cut of a whip. -Almost before he could gasp twice, the confounded thing was running -away. - -“Whoa!” shouted the dismayed man commandingly, surging back on the -wheel with all his strength. “If the bit holds, I’ll break your jaw, -you——” - -One foot was planted on the accelerator, jamming it down and opening -the throttle wide. The engine roared beneath the quivering hood. The -car made a jump that seemed to take all four wheels off the ground. -Judge Wiggin’s hat flew off, his sparse gray hair stood on end, his -eyes bulged; but between his parted, drawn-back lips his teeth were -set. Behind him he heard the horrified shouts of the crowd, through -which Hitchens had vainly tried to plow a path in time to board the -machine before it could get beyond his reach. Realizing he had -failed, Hitchens stopped and flung up his arms in despair. - -“The old fool!” he groaned. “He’ll smash the car! He’ll be killed!” - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - -WORSE THAN A WILD HORSE. - - -Annoyed and amazed by the inexplicable and cantankerous behavior of -the automobile, Nathan Wiggin was, at the same time, aroused to -resentment and wrath. The confounded thing was acting exactly like a -wild, viciously ugly, unbroken colt. Immediately the judge’s -fighting blood rose. He was stirred by the tingling joy of contest; -it throbbed in every vein of his body. Still holding the throttle -wide open with one foot, he planted the other on the brake, and -sawed at the wheel. - -The things the automobile did then made it seem more than ever like -a strong and furious young horse battling against restraint and -mastery. It bucked and plunged in jerky jumps; it “pitched -fence-cornered” from side to side, after the style of a Western -broncho; it snorted and choked and snorted again. - -“Whoa, you dratted catamaran!” snarled the judge. “You’ve gotter -whoa or I’ll take your jaw off!” - -Only for the down grade he might have stalled the engine before the -racking of the car caused his foot to fly off the brake pedal. When -that happened, it continued on its way down the hill toward the -wooden bridge that spanned the Swampscott River, swaying from one -side of the road to the other. At times it threatened to climb trees -or telephone poles, or crash through fences and plunge like a -battering-ram into the fronts of houses or stores. But always the -crazy machine swerved in time to avoid disaster, and shot across to -the other side of the road. - -When his right hand slipped from the wheel, the judge grabbed the -side of the car body, and his clutching thumb jammed down the button -that operated the electric siren. The button stuck, and the siren -howled like a doomed demon of despair, causing Nathan Wiggin’s hair -to stand up stiff as the bristles on a horse brush. - -The fearsome sound of the wailing whistle brought people running to -windows to behold a sight no one in Greenbush had ever expected to -see—Judge Wiggin driving an automobile! To say that he was driving -it more than borders on hyperbole; it would be far closer to the -truth to state that it was driving him—frantic! He was not -habitually a profane man, but he possessed a broad vocabulary of -vigorous expletives of a more or less impious nature; and it must be -admitted that the language he addressed to that motor car would have -shocked a parson. Those who dashed to their windows in time to see -him shoot zigzagging past beheld a man that was little short of -raving mad. - -Hens that had been scratching peacefully in the village street fled, -squawking. Barking furiously, a yellow dog charged out. The car -leaped at the animal, struck it with one forward wheel, and sent it, -spinning and howling, into the gutter. - -Deaf as a doormat, old Betsy Tucker, going to market with a hand -basket containing two dozen eggs, neither saw nor heard until the -runaway auto was perilously close upon her and the judge was howling -like a maniac for her to “clear the road.” Then she gave a yell and -threw up her arms, flinging basket and eggs into the air. She was -saved by sheer luck, for the judge, plunging at the wheel, turned -the machine so that it missed her by less than a foot. The basket -came down, bottom up, on Nathan Wiggin’s head, and the eggs—well, -for some moments thereafter the judge could not have seen to drive, -had he possessed the required skill. From his shoulders up he -resembled the initial preparation of an omelet. - -“Holy sassafras!” he spluttered. “It’s raining fish glue! Everything -happens at once!” - -As soon as he could blink a pair of peepholes through that golden -film—he did not dare let go with his hands to wipe his eyes—he saw -that the foot of the hill was almost reached, and that the bridge -across the peacefully flowing river lay just ahead. It was not a -very wide bridge, and Tobias Blaisdell, perched on a load of hay -drawn by two horses, was just driving on to the far end. - -“Back up, you blinkety-blank jay-hawker!” yelled the judge. “Make a -clear passage or I’ll bore a tunnel in ye!” - -Had he been less excited he would have realized that it was much too -late for such a cumbersome obstruction to get out of the way. -Blaisdell had time only to check his horses and stare in horror at -the shrieking engine of destruction that was charging upon him. He -did not recognize Nathan Wiggin in the egg-bespattered wild man who -seemed to be guiding the humming mechanism of disaster, but he knew -that, in about four seconds, unless a miracle intervened, horses, -motor car, hay, and human beings were going to be mixed in a -spectacular and tragic smash. - -Then, as the uncontrolled automobile reached the middle span of the -bridge, the miracle took place. Shooting suddenly to one side, the -machine struck the wooden railing, and went through it as if it had -been constructed of clay pipestems. Into the deepest part of the -river it plunged, flinging up a great sulash of spray, and -disappeared from view. Nathan Wiggin, of Greenbush, vanished with -it. - - - - -CHAPTER IX - -WHEN THE LIMIT CAME OFF. - - -The shouts of the startled crowd in front of Turner’s grocery had -brought those within the store rushing out to learn the cause of -alarm. The governor came with them, followed a second later by the -young man who had been tossed by Libby’s bull. They beheld the motor -car well under way, and the judge struggling frantically and -ineffectually to restrain it. - -“Great guns!” groaned the governor, turning pale. “Wiggin’s started -the demonstration on his own hook. He’ll smash a -four-thousand-dollar car and his neck at the same time!” - -The young man with the bandaged head stiffened. If he felt weak or -dizzy at that moment, he flung it off instantly. With a single bound -he was at the foot of the store steps, against which leaned a -bicycle, left there temporarily by some one. He grabbed the bicycle, -uttering a ringing shout for everybody to get out of the way. - -Through the scattered crowd he dashed, leaping to the saddle and -catching the pedals with his nimble feet. Bending over the -handlebars, he started in pursuit of the automobile, which, by this -time, was halfway down the hill, with the wailing siren in full -blast. - -Continuing to jabber and shout, the crowd followed, stringing out in -a straggling line. Boys and younger men were in the lead. -Middle-aged, bewhiskered, bald-headed men came next. The rear guard -was made up of the aged and decrepit; the very last one of all, bent -with rheumatism, and hobbling with the aid of two canes, being -Zebediah Titcomb, the sage of Greenbush. - -Never since its foundation had the sleepy town of Greenbush beheld -such a spectacle. Never in its history had there been such -tremendous excitement within its boundaries. The end of all things -terrestrial could scarcely have created a greater hullabaloo in that -torpid community. - -The young man on the bicycle was not able to overtake the runaway -motor car before it reached the bridge, but he was not far behind -it. When the automobile smashed through the railing and leaped into -the river, he jumped from the bicycle and followed it without the -slightest hesitation. - -He was an excellent swimmer, and, rising from the plunge, he saw the -head of Nathan Wiggin bob to the surface within reach of his arm. -Immediately he fastened a hand on the man’s collar. - -“Keep still! Stop thrashing,” he said, “and I’ll get you out.” - -The somewhat difficult task of rescuing Judge Wiggin from drowning -was accomplished, while the panting throng that had reached the -bridge looked on and cheered. Reaching shallow water, the young man -assisted the judge to his feet, and both waded forth to dry land. - -Arriving on shore, the older man immediately sat down facing the -river, beneath the sluggish surface of which Governor Bradley’s -automobile lay immersed. After a few choking gulps, he began to -speak in accents and words of the utmost self-contempt. - -“Nate Wiggin,” he said, addressing himself, “you’ve lived to be -fifty-four year old, and arrived at the conclusion that there wasn’t -anything that traveled on legs or wheels that you couldn’t handle. -Which goes to show that when a man thinks he knows all there is to -know about anything a shrinkage has set in about half an inch -beneath the roots of his hair. A wise fool is about as safe to have -round as a stick of dynamite bakin’ in the oven of a red-hot stove. -If he don’t damage nobody else, he’s pretty likely to blow up and -bust himself.” - -The governor and his secretary, followed by a few others, came -hurrying to the spot. Seeing them approach, the judge got upon his -feet, dripping tiny rivulets. - -“Governor,” he observed, “there’s no great loss without some small -gain. You’ll save the price of a wash for that there automobile. -Whatever damage or expense may accrue I ca’late I’ll have to -sustain. I guess we can find a way to get her out.” - -“I’m thankful,” said Governor Bradley, “that you were not killed.” - -“I don’t see why that should choke you with joy. In your place I’d -prob’ly be so blazin’ mad I’d start in to murder somebody.” - -His eyes streaming and his nose snuffling, Weeping Buzzell broke in: -“Obadiah Cobb has come along with his hoss and wagon. He’s right -there at the end of the bridge, and he’ll take ye home, jedge. You -better git outer them wet clothes it you don’t want to ketch your -everlarsting.” - -“I’m no wetter’n this young feller who yanked me outer the drink,” -said the judge. “He’s got to come along to the house with me and get -fixed up. And you, too, governor, and t’other gentleman—you come; I -insist on it. You’re going to stop with me, the whole caboodle of -ye, to supper. Hosspitality deferred may be hosspitality soured, but -I’ll guarantee to do my best to sweeten it up on this occasion.” - -By this time it seemed that by far the greater portion of the -inhabitants of the town were packed upon the bridge or jamming the -roadway. And when Obadiah Cobb took the governor, the judge, and the -other two men into his double seater and started back up the hill -with them, the crowd laughed and cheered again. - -“Governor,” said Judge Wiggin, “I dunno whether that’s meant for you -or for the young man who hauled me out of the stream, but either way -it’s proper well deserved. If you hadn’t been dead game, you’d have -kicked like a steer over what’s happened, and if he wasn’t good grit -to the bone he’d never have gone into the river arter me. Which is -admittin’ I made a mistake in sizing him up when I found my darter -making a touse over him.” - -Among the few villagers who remained unaware of the recent lively -events were Judge Wiggin’s sister and his daughter. Of course they -were thrown into a great flutter. Miss Sally said: “My stars!” What -Miss Bessie said was whispered into the ear of the water-soaked but -smiling young man, who gave her a look and a sly squeeze of the hand -that brought a rosy flush to her cheeks. - -Dry clothes were found; also “a little nip of something to parry off -chills.” Warming up, the participants in the adventure joked and -laughed, even though the judge seemed to have something on his mind -that was giving him some serious thought. What this was appeared -later after they had partaken of a genuine old-fashioned New England -supper, topped off with doughnuts and hot apple pie and steaming, -fragrant coffee. - -Turning his eyes to the governor, who sat at the right of Miss -Sally, Nathan Wiggin said: “Governor, putting aside the question of -damages I owe on account of what happened to your automobile, -ca’late it’s up to me to express my appreciation of whut you done to -induce Ephraim Glover to take back and give me a clear field. With a -clear start, I reckon I can carry this deestrict, and help you to -carry the county. Anyhow, I’m going to lay myself out to do it.” - -“That sounds good to me,” laughed the governor. - -“Furthermore,” pursued the host, “I’ve decided to abolish the -trapping of automobile drivers in this here town. Mebbe,” he -admitted, “this may appear a leetle dite selfish on my part as, -havin’ got my dander up by the pranks played on me by that there gas -go-cart of yourn, governor, I’m contemplating buying one myself and -running the consarned cantraption until I git it tamed. If there was -traps hereabouts, mebbe I’d git took up and have to fine myself for -busting the speed limit. Therefore, henceforth there ain’t going to -be no speed limit in Greenbush.” - -Beneath the edge of the table, old Shep, attempting to lick Bessie’s -hand with his tongue, licked also the hand of the young man who sat -beside her. And before sitting down, the young people had found an -opportunity, quite unobserved, to exchange a few words in private. -Somehow neither of them had evinced any great desire for food, but -while George was still unnaturally pale, the roses continued to -bloom in Bessie’s cheeks. - -Now George spoke up boldly: “As long as you have abolished the speed -limit, Judge Wiggin, I am going to improve the occasion to ask you -for your daughter’s hand in marriage. Doubtless it will seem rather -hasty to you, but everything has moved with a rush this afternoon. I -have put the question to Bessie, and won her consent.” - -The governor stared. Miss Nancy nearly fainted. Bessie Wiggin -trembled visibly. Nathan P. Wiggin gazed hard at the young man for -about thirty seconds, and then scratched his chin, a queer pucker -screwing up his face. - -“Wull, I declare!” said the judge at last. “That is going some! -Never quite reckoned on my darter hookin’ up with a shuffer, but, -having saved me from drownding, you’ve took me at a disadvantage. If -Bessie has said yes, and you kin furnish the proper creedenshuls -I’ll have to take your proposition under consideration, I guess.” - -The governor looked Bessie Wiggin over appraisingly, and decided -that he had made no mistake in thinking her an unusually pretty and -charming young lady. - -“It is sudden,” he said, laughing softly, “and it would not have -happened if George had not offered to drive for me to-day, my -regular chauffeur being ill. In the way of credentials, judge, let -me state that he is my son.” - -The judge’s sister sat bolt upright in a jiffy. The judge coughed -behind his hand, the pucker crinkling the corners of his eyes. - -“Them creedenshuls, governor,” he stated, “are wholly satisfactory -to me.” His whole body seemed to shake oddly. “I’m afraid I’m going -to have a chill, after all,” he added. “I think the governor and me -had better take a little walk in the moonlight.” - - - THE END - - -[Transcriber’s Note: This story appeared in the May 1, 1915 issue -of the _Top Notch_ magazine published by Street & Smith Company.] - -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SHAMING THE SPEED LIMIT *** - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the -United States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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Thus, we do not -necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper -edition. - -Most people start at our website which has the main PG search -facility: www.gutenberg.org - -This website includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/old/65914-0.zip b/old/65914-0.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index f7b59a9..0000000 --- a/old/65914-0.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/65914-h.zip b/old/65914-h.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index d1bf20a..0000000 --- a/old/65914-h.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/65914-h/65914-h.htm b/old/65914-h/65914-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index 28f53a4..0000000 --- a/old/65914-h/65914-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,1901 +0,0 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html> -<html lang="en"> -<head> - <meta charset="utf-8" /> - <title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Shaming the Speed Limit, by Burt L. Standish</title> - <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" /> - <style> - body { margin-left:8%; margin-right:8%; font-size:medium } - .chapter { margin-top:4em; margin-bottom:4em; } - .x-ebookmaker .chapter { margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0; } - .chapter p { text-indent:1.15em; margin-top:0.1em; margin-bottom:0.1em; text-align:justify; } - .section { margin-top:4em; margin-bottom:4em; } - h1, h2 { text-align:center; font-weight:normal; } - h1 { font-size:1.4em; } - h2 { font-size:1.1em; margin-bottom:2em; margin-top:4em; } - h2 span { font-size:0.9em; } - a, a:visited { color: #00008b; } - a:hover { color: red; } - .figcenter { clear:both; max-width:100%; margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:2em; text-align:center; } - .figcenter p { text-align:center; text-indent:0; margin-top:0; } - .figcenter img { width:100%; } - .portrait { margin-left:15%; width:70%; } - .landscape { margin-left:5%; width:90%; } - .x-ebookmaker .portrait { margin-left:5%; width:90%; } - hr.tb { margin-left:25%; width:50%; margin-top: 1em; margin-bottom:1em; border:none; border-bottom: 1px solid; } - </style> -</head> - -<body> -<p style='text-align:center; font-size:1.2em; font-weight:bold'>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Shaming the Speed Limit, by Burt L. Standish</p> -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online -at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you -are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this eBook. -</div> - -<p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: Shaming the Speed Limit</p> - <p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Burt L. Standish</p> -<p style='display:block; text-indent:0; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: July 24, 2021 [eBook #65914]</p> -<p style='display:block; text-indent:0; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</p> - <p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em; text-align:left'>Produced by: Roger Frank and Sue Clark.</p> -<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SHAMING THE SPEED LIMIT ***</div> - -<div class='section'> - <div class='figcenter landscape' id='i001'> - <img src='images/title.jpg' alt='All Wool' /> - </div> -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> -<div style='text-align:center;'> - <h1>Shaming the Speed Limit</h1> - <div style='font-size:1.1em; margin-bottom:0.7em;'>By Burt L. Standish</div> -</div> - -<h2 id='ch_I' title="A Girl, a Dog, and a Man."> - <span>CHAPTER I</span><br/>A GIRL, A DOG, AND A MAN. -</h2> - -<p>When Miss Elizabeth Wiggin settled herself comfortably in the shade of the -spreading oak in Libby’s pasture, she looked forward eagerly to a pleasant and -quiet hour with her book, “Wooed, Won, and Wedded.” As may be surmised from the -title of the book, Miss Wiggin was romantic. She was likewise just eighteen -years of age, and the daughter of Judge Nathan P. Wiggin, of Greenbush, the -village that could be seen nestling in the valley something like a mile distant -from that hillside oak.</p> - -<p>Miss Wiggin lived in Greenbush, but on pleasant afternoons she had a habit of -wandering away, accompanied only by an aged shepherd dog, in search of some spot -where she could read without fear of interruption. For her grim old father -objected to trashy love stories, and her ascetic spinster aunt, who had acted as -the judge’s housekeeper since the death of Mrs. Wiggin, held all such fiction in -abhorrence.</p> - -<p>Indeed, the animus of Aunt Sally Wiggin against stories depicting the ravages -wrought by the little god of the bow and arrow was so extreme that, by -consigning such terrible tales to the flames whenever she found them about the -house, she conscientiously did her best to prevent them from turning the head of -her niece. She even forbade the village news dealer to sell Bessie any more -books of that type.</p> - -<p>In these days, however, it is no easy matter to deprive any one of the mental -pabulum that is desired, and Aunt Sally had set herself a task that she could -not accomplish. Lemuel Dodd, Judge Wiggin’s hostler and man of all work, -red-headed, freckled, and homely as a slump fence, undeterred by the -discouraging fact that his persistent efforts to make love to Bessie seemed -merely to arouse her amusement, became her secret and faithful ally. Twice a -week, at least, he spent twenty-five cents of his wages for a paper-covered -novel to be smuggled into her possession, and invariably he chose the ones whose -titles seemed to promise that their contents would come up to Elizabeth’s -requirements.</p> - -<p>“There ain’t many single fellers left round this town,” Lemuel told himself, -“and mebbe if she reads enough of them yarns she’ll git so desprit she’ll have -to grab what’s handy. And when she gits the notion to grab, I’m going to take -keer that I’m the handiest thing in reach.”</p> - -<p>And so, on this sunny September afternoon, Bessie Wiggin was seeking the -shade of the oak in Libby’s pasture, presumably afar from interruption, and -prepared thoroughly to enjoy Lemuel’s latest contribution. Her face was almost -hidden by one of Aunt Sally’s extremely old-fashioned sunbonnets, which she had -hastily taken when she slipped out of the house with the book. Shep, the old -dog, stretched himself in the short grass at her feet and prepared to go to -sleep comfortably.</p> - -<p>The view from this spot, at a considerable distance from the brown road that -wound, ribbonlike, down into the village, was pleasant to the eye, but the -judge’s daughter lost no time in admiring the scenery. She was soon absorbed in -the pages of her novel.</p> - -<p>So absorbed did she become that she failed to hear the approaching steps of a -somewhat dusty and soiled, but decidedly good-looking, young man in a brown -Norfolk suit, knee-length leather leggings, and a motoring cap. He was within a -few yards of her when he saw her and stopped.</p> - -<p>“I beg your pardon, madam,” he said, looking down upon the obscuring -sunbonnet.</p> - -<p>She uttered a little startled scream, and looked up, her blue eyes wide, her -red lips parted. A glimpse of the pretty and youthful face which the sunbonnet -had concealed caused the stranger to catch his breath.</p> - -<p>“Reginald!” exclaimed Miss Wiggin, beholding before her the living -incarnation of the hero of her book just as her fancy had pictured him.</p> - -<p>“Daphne!” said the young man, thinking of the mythological wood nymph.</p> - -<p>“Woof!” barked the old dog, awaking and springing up as quickly as age and -rheumatism would allow.</p> - -<p>The stranger backed round to the opposite side of the tree. “Keep that beast -away from me, please,” he begged, in evident apprehension.</p> - -<p>With a swift sweep of one slender hand, Miss Wiggin thrust back the -sunbonnet, which, held by the loosely knotted ribbons, hung suspended on her -shoulders, exposing a mass of wavy, golden-brown hair. At the same moment, with -remarkable agility and grace, she half rose and half turned. On her knees, her -right hand clasping the book, the fingers of her left hand lightly touching the -ground, her gaze followed the shrinking young man, who was now fearfully -watching the ominously growling dog. Surely this was unexpected and -disappointing behavior for Reginald, the brave, who—in her novel—had -unhesitatingly faced the most frightful perils for his lady fair.</p> - -<p>Made suspicious by the actions of the stranger, Shep advanced, bristling and -snapping. As if contemplating instant flight, the young man gave one hasty look -around. The nearest fence was some six or eight rods away, and it did not -promise to stop a ferocious and angry dog in pursuit of a fleeing fugitive, and -there was no other refuge in sight.</p> - -<p>“Keep that creature away, won’t you?” again entreated the agitated man, -placing the trunk of the tree between himself and the animal. “I detest -dogs!”</p> - -<p>“Oh, Reginald!” sighed Bessie Wiggin in bitter disappointment!</p> - -<p>“Oh, hang it!” exploded the stranger, with shocking violence. “If I had a -gun——”</p> - -<p>Shep charged, barking violently. He meant to stop out of reach of the man’s -feet in case he showed a disposition to kick. But, making a great leap, the -stranger clutched a stout lower limb of the tree, and swung himself up out of -the reach of harm with the most amazing celerity, the dog snapping at his heels -as they receded skyward.</p> - -<p>Perched astride the limb, with his feet drawn up, the refugee shook his fist -at the raging animal, which, inflamed by success, made another great jump into -the air and fell back on the ground, his age-enfeebled legs collapsing beneath -him.</p> - -<p>Still kneeling, the girl burst into a peal of laughter.</p> </div> - -<div class='chapter'> - -<h2 id='ch_II' title="Romance Justified."> - <span>CHAPTER II</span><br/>ROMANCE JUSTIFIED. -</h2> - -<p>“Go to it!” said the exasperated man in the tree. “Get in your laugh while -the laughing’s good. If your confounded dog had succeeded in chewing some chunks -out of me, I suppose you’d simply have collapsed with merriment.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, dear!” gasped Miss Wiggin, trying to suppress her mirth. “If you only -realized how ridiculous it is! Old Shep couldn’t hurt a sick kitten.”</p> - -<p>“Huh!” grunted the stranger skeptically. “Perhaps not, but he certainly -showed a strong desire to plant a few teeth in any part of my person that he -could reach.”</p> - -<p>Miss Wiggin continued to laugh. “It would have to be a <i>few</i> teeth, as -he’s lost almost all that he ever had, and he’s so old that he’s half deaf and -getting blind. That’s why he didn’t warn me that you were coming. If you hadn’t -shown that you were scared, he’d never have made an offer to touch you.”</p> - -<p>“How was I to know that?” demanded the man on the limb, flushing. “On such -short notice I couldn’t tell whether he was a senile and harmless old dog or a -young and savage one bent on making a meal off my person.”</p> - -<p>“You’re an awful coward, aren’t you?” asked the girl, rising to her feet and -regarding him with open contempt.</p> - -<p>She was slender, willowy, and graceful. He considered that she was the -prettiest girl he had ever seen, and he wondered how, even with the sunbonnet -hiding her face, he had made the blunder of mistaking her for a middle-aged -woman. He felt his heart thumping queerly. He also felt his face burning beneath -her unmasked disdain.</p> - -<p>“Let me explain,” he pleaded hastily.</p> - -<p>“It isn’t necessary,” she cut him short. “I don’t suppose there are any -Reginalds to be found outside the pages of fiction.”</p> - -<p>“The Daphnes,” he returned, “are myths.”</p> - -<p>She tossed her head. “Besides being a ’fraid cat,” she retorted, “you’re just -about the most impolite person I ever met. What were you doing prowling around -in this field, anyhow?”</p> - -<p>“Being in haste to secure a conveyance to Albion for two gentlemen whose -motor has broken down back yonder on the road, I was making a short cut to town -and avoiding the most of the hill. The gentlemen must catch the three-forty -train at Albion. It is now,” he stated, balancing himself on the limb and taking -out his watch, “seven minutes past two.”</p> - -<p>“And twenty-three miles to Albion. Your gentlemen will have to hurry.”</p> - -<p>“They may make it if I can get an automobile in town.”</p> - -<p>Again she laughed. “Automobiles aren’t popular in Greenbush. Peter Beedy is -the only citizen who owns one. He’s been arrested and fined four times for -exceeding the speed limit of eight miles an hour. The last time that happened he -was so mad he swore he’d never start the machine again, and he had it towed to -his barn and stored away.”</p> - -<p>“Thanks for the information. Me for Peter Beedy.” He glanced downward. -Sitting on his haunches and gazing upward with a wistful eye, Shep was licking -his old chops. “If you will be good enough to call your dog away and keep a -firm, restraining hand upon him, I’ll hit the high spots between here and Mr. -Beedy’s domicile.”</p> - -<p>“As long as you’re so completely lacking in sand,” said she, “I’ll collar -Shep and hold him until you get a fair start. But let me warn you that if you -succeed in getting Beedy’s auto you’ll certainly be pinched and fined if you’re -caught driving faster than eight miles an hour anywhere within the town -limits.”</p> - -<p>“It’s always necessary,” was his retort, “first to catch your hare. If -Beedy’s bubble has any speed at all, somebody will be handed a laugh. When you -give the word, I’ll come down.”</p> - -<p>Now it chanced that neither of them had noticed the approach of Libby’s bull, -confined in that same pasture. The bull was ugly, and resentful of intrusion on -its domain. And just as the girl placed one hand on the dog’s collar the bull -charged, with a snort and a bellow. The man on the limb shouted a warning. The -girl screamed and dodged behind the tree. The dog, seeing the charging beast by -accident, bounded lamely to meet him. And the bull, with one sweep of his horns, -tossed the dog fifteen feet into the air.</p> - -<p>The man in the tree was paralyzed with horror. The disastrous attempt of the -dog to protect his mistress seemed to check the charging bull for barely a -fraction of a second. With glaring eyes, the beast came on, dashing straight at -the terrified girl.</p> - -<p>“The fence!” shouted the man. “Run!”</p> - -<p>Even as he uttered the words he realized what would happen if she attempted -to obey. The infuriated beast would overtake her, toss her with its horns even -as the old dog had been tossed, gore her, trample the life out of her delicate -body. For the briefest fraction of time, he was sickened by the thought. Then he -dropped from the tree directly in the path of the mad creature. As he dropped, -he snatched the cap from his head. The instant his toes touched the turf, he -sprang to one side. The bull missed him by a foot, and he struck the animal -across the eyes with his cap.</p> - -<p>It seemed like a feeble thing to do, but he had time for nothing else, and he -hoped desperately to turn the attention of the beast from the girl; hoped -somehow, by diverting the creature’s fury to himself, to give her an opportunity -to flee to safety beyond the fence.</p> - -<p>The girl had circled round the tree, keeping it between herself and the bull. -As the man struck the animal, the latter swerved and turned with amazing speed, -surprised, perhaps, by the appearance of a second human being on the scene. The -stranger waved his arms and shouted challengingly. The animal accepted the -challenge promptly and charged at him.</p> - -<p>“Oh!” gasped Miss Wiggin. “He’ll be—killed!”</p> - -<p>But, almost with the agility of a capeador, the young man again leaped aside -at precisely the right moment to foil the beast. Again he struck with his cap, -but this time it was impaled on one of the bull’s horns and torn from his -hand.</p> - -<p>Without glancing round at the girl, he cried sharply, commandingly: “Run for -the fence! I’ll keep him busy till you are safe.”</p> - -<p>Bessie Wiggin ran, just as she was ordered to do, although she did not -realize what she was doing until she had almost reached the fence. Too terrified -to look back, she actually sailed over the barrier almost as a frightened deer -might have done, scarcely touching the top rail, falling safe on the far side -amid some bowlders and bushes, where for a moment she lay panting and -helpless.</p> - -<p>She was aroused by Shep. The faithful old dog had not been killed. Limping -and whining, he had followed her in her flight and dragged himself through the -fence. Still whining plaintively, he was licking her face.</p> - -<p>With a sobbing cry, she seized the fence and pulled herself to her feet. -Still baiting the bull, the young man was dodging round and round the tree, the -enraged beast making every effort to reach him. He had kept his word; he had -held the attention of the animal while she escaped; the handsome stranger she -had called a coward had taken this dreadful risk for her.</p> - -<p>Realizing the danger he was in, she called to him wildly: “Oh, look -out—look out! Jump—quick! Run! Do something!”</p> - -<p>He certainly was doing something; in fact, he was an extremely busy person -just then. Again and again he appeared to avoid the rushes of the bull barely by -a hair’s breadth. Each time this happened the girl’s heart seemed ready to burst -with terror. It could not last long. The snorting, bellowing beast would get him -at last. A slight miscalculation, the slightest slip, and it would all be -over.</p> - -<p>Bessie Wiggin grasped a stake of the fence, and tried desperately to tear it -loose, intending to return to the assistance of the stranger with this weapon. -She was the coward, after all! She had run away and left him to be killed!</p> - -<p>Then she saw him “put over” a bit of strategy on the bull. The animal had -paused for a moment, and turned slowly upon him, pawing the ground. Instead of -placing the tree between himself and danger, the man planted his back against -it, his eyes never leaving the beast for an instant.</p> - -<p>Waving his hands in gestures of disdain, he taunted the creature. “Come on, -old lumberheels! Wake up and show a little pep! Throw into high gear and give us -some speed. Don’t quit now; the fun’s just begun. Wake up! Come on!”</p> - -<p>The bull leaped forward like a hurricane. And just as the pale and horrified -girl expected to see the man impaled to the tree, he slipped deftly behind it. -The head of the bull crashed against the oak, and the animal staggered as if -struck by a butcher’s maul.</p> - -<p>The stranger laughed. “That ought to give you a slight headache,” he -said.</p> - -<p>“Run!” cried the girl. “This way—quick! Now’s the time!”</p> - -<p>Dazed, the bull was backing off slowly, shaking his head. Evidently the man -agreed with Bessie that the moment was propitious, for he turned and raced -toward the fence. But the animal had not been injured nearly as much as one -might have supposed, and, seeing his mocking foe in flight, he plunged in -pursuit.</p> - -<p>The stranger was fleet-footed, but the bull was a trifle fleeter. Just as the -runner gathered himself to take the fence with one clean leap, the beast -overtook him. Through the air sailed the man, propelled by the head and horns of -the bull, as well as by the spring of his own legs. Over the fence in a great -curve he came, crashing head downward amid the rocks and bushes.</p> - -<p>When the young man opened his eyes again, he discovered that his head was -resting in the lap of Miss Bessie Wiggin, who, sobbing hysterically, was wiping -his forehead with a bloodstained handkerchief.</p> - -<p>He looked up at her and smiled. “Daphne!” he whispered.</p> - -<p>“Reginald!” she cried.</p> - -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - -<h2 id='ch_III' title="It Never Ran Smooth"> - <span>CHAPTER III</span><br/>IT NEVER RAN SMOOTH. -</h2> - -<p>“You’re not killed, are you?” she sobbed, trying to stanch the flow of blood -that trickled from a gash at the edge of his hair near his temple.</p> - -<p>“If I am,” he returned, with a feeble effort to jest, “I don’t know it -yet.”</p> - -<p>“But you’re hurt. You struck on your head.”</p> - -<p>“Probably that saved my life. Solid ivory, you know. I will admit that I feel -a trifle upset, so to speak. No, don’t move—please don’t! The mere thought -of your moving gives me pain.”</p> - -<p>“But I must go for help. You’re wounded.”</p> - -<p>“I am,” he admitted, gazing up into her blue eyes in a manner that gave her a -most peculiar sensation. “Mortally wounded. I fear. I never was hit so hard in -my life, and I am afraid I can’t recover.”</p> - -<p>Again she cried out in apprehension and distress. “Oh, I was afraid you were -done for when that beast caught you!”</p> - -<p>“I am,” was his singularly cheerful acknowledgment; “I’m done for. I’ve got -mine. The jig is up with me.”</p> - -<p>“Is it your arms, your legs? Your ribs—are they smashed? Where do you -feel it most?”</p> - -<p>“Here,” he answered, putting his hand to his heart. “Rut it isn’t my ribs; -it’s something deeper, Daphne.”</p> - -<p>“That isn’t my name; it’s Bessie.”</p> - -<p>“Bessie! Mine’s George. Awfully commonplace, isn’t it? Now, if my folks had -only called me Reginald——”</p> - -<p>“You mustn’t try to talk. I’m sure it’s painful. You must keep still.”</p> - -<p>“I will if you’ll keep on talking yourself. The sound of your voice soothes -me like the murmuring of a brook. Your eyes are like springtime violets. The -touch of your little hand is as delicious as a draft of pure water to a person -dying of thirst. Now I’ll leave it to you if a Reginald could beat that speech -much.”</p> - -<p>She stiffened and drew back a bit, the color beginning to return to her pale -cheeks. They looked at each other steadily, and the returning flush covered her -face.</p> - -<p>Beyond the fence the victorious bull pawed the ground; from a vantage of -safety the old dog glared through the rails and regarded the bull with -disapproval, but the man and girl paid no attention to either of them. The girl -had turned her gaze toward the distant road that wound down into the -village.</p> - -<p>“I don’t believe you are hurt much,” she said, in a low voice, which, -however, was made unsteady by a queer little throbbing in her throat. “If you -were, you couldn’t talk like that.”</p> - -<p>“It’s because I am that I can talk like that,” he declared. “It’s the first -time I ever talked that way to any one.”</p> - -<p>“Your friends who have to get to Albion,” she murmured; “I’m afraid they’ll -lose their train.”</p> - -<p>“By Jove!” he cried, sitting up suddenly. “I’d clean forgotten them!”</p> - -<p>“You were fooling me!” she exclaimed, as she started to rise.</p> - -<p>With a groan he fell back. The crimson, oozing from his wound, ran down -across his temple, and in another moment she was again checking the flow with -her handkerchief. His eyes were closed, and she imagined he had fainted.</p> - -<p>“Oh, dear!” She seemed distraught. “I don’t know what to do! I’ve got to get -help, but if I leave you, you may bleed to death.”</p> - -<p>“Don’t let me bleed to death,” he begged faintly. “Don’t leave -me—Bessie. You mustn’t leave me—as long as I live.”</p> - -<p>It seemed a great effort for him to lift his eyelids, but he looked at her -again, and the appeal in his eyes filled her with a feeling of desperation.</p> - -<p>“You must have a doctor.”</p> - -<p>“You’re the only doctor I want. You’re the only doctor who can cure me. If -you throw up the case and turn me over to a common pill slinger, I’ll never get -over it.”</p> - -<p>“But I’ve simply got to get help for you somehow. I’ll hurry.”</p> - -<p>“I can’t let you go. I’m an awful coward, you know, and——”</p> - -<p>“You’re nothing of the sort! I’ve never seen anybody as brave as you -are.”</p> - -<p>A tremor ran over his body. At first she thought it was a convulsive movement -of pain, but when it continued she was overcome by the astounding conviction -that he was laughing. Astonishment gave place to outraged indignation. There was -no mistaking the fact that he was really shaking with laughter that he sought in -vain to suppress. She leaped up, letting him drop back, and stood rigid, filled -with intense resentment.</p> - -<p>“You—you’re making sport of me!” she said, in a low voice that suddenly -had in it something like icy brittleness. “You’ve been playing on my sympathy! -You’re not really hurt—much. It was a very ungentlemanly thing to do! I -hope you have enjoyed yourself!”</p> - -<p>He sat up without much effort. “I give you my word of honor that I didn’t -mean to laugh at you. Perhaps my head is affected a little. This crack on the -bean must be the cause. It really was some bump.”</p> - -<p>“You—you wretch!” she cried, stamping her foot. “I hate you!”</p> - -<p>Her little hands were tightly clenched. She turned away to hide the tears -which welled again into her eyes; but now they were tears of exasperation, -shame, and rage.</p> - -<p>He got quickly to his feet. “Please, Bessie!” he said. “You don’t understand. -Not for the world would I——”</p> - -<p>He stopped short, staring across at the road, down which a touring car -containing two men was speeding toward the village.</p> - -<p>“Great Caesar!” he cried. “There goes the governor! Hitchens must have got -the engine running somehow. They’ll expect to find me in town.” With all the -strength of a good pair of lungs, he shouted, waving his hands above his head. -The automobile sped on. Its occupants neither saw nor heard him.</p> - -<p>“I guess I’m left for the time being,” he said. “They’ll go ripping straight -through to catch that train at Albion.”</p> - -<p>“They won’t rip through very far,” Miss Wiggin flung at him. “There’s a trap -just outside the village, watched by a deputy sheriff and two constables. Your -old governor will be nabbed and pulled up before my father, who will soak him -with a fine. And I hope dad soaks him good,” she finished, laughing, and doing -so with a vindictiveness that seemed to afford her untold relief and -satisfaction.</p> - -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - -<h2 id='ch_IV' title="The Trappers."> - <span>CHAPTER IV</span><br/>THE TRAPPERS. -</h2> - -<p>Jeremiah Small, constable of the town of Greenbush, sat on the top rail of -the roadside fence and wedged a load of fine cut into the bowl of a burned, -blackened, odorous corncob pipe, packing it down with a decidedly dirty thumb. -From his perch he could look over the top of a cluster of low sumacs and keep -watch upon a point on the hillside where the highway wound into view. He could -also see, somewhat nearer, a tall and lonely elm tree, past which the road ran -in a broadside curve.</p> - -<p>“Weeping” Buzzell, another constable, was sitting on the ground in the shade -of the sumacs, leaning against the fence, and occasionally wiping his red-rimmed -and watery eyes with a faded and mussed bandanna handkerchief. His jaws worked -wearily at a quid of tobacco, the presence of which was further advertised by -the unmistakable stains at the corners of his doleful and flabby mouth. He had -chosen his lowly position for comfort, and because his companion was far better -adapted to the task of outlook.</p> - -<p>“I tell you, ’Miah,” sniffed Buzzell, “this here job is jest about played -out. A dollar-sixty a day ain’t no livin’ pay for a hard-workin’ man, and that’s -all we git outside commissions on the fines the jedge imposes, and the deputy -sheruff gits the biggest whack at them. We have to be pacified with what comes -outer the little end o’ the horn. Yis-tidday my share was thutty-two cents, and -so fur to-day we ain’t nabbed only one motor-cycle feller who come through by -accident, havin’ got off the road to Damascus. I’m gittin’ discouraged.”</p> - -<p>Constable Small made a final poke at the pipe bowl, and glanced down at the -complaining individual. “Never knowed you to tackle any job that you didn’t git -discouraged over in a short time, Silas,” he averred contemptuously. “Gittin’ -discouraged is your long suit. You’ve been discouraged all your life.”</p> - -<p>Buzzell moved his slouching shoulders resentfully. “Mebbe that’s so, ’Miah, -but I ain’t never had no luck, like some folks. When I was swore in as constable -and put on this job, there was an av’rage of eighteen or twenty merchines a day -that went through town regardless of speed regerlations. Business was lively, -and I sorter guessed my luck had turned. But now them there automobile fellers -has got wise and sent out warnin’s and posted notices in all the garrages round -about cautionin’ folks to keep away from Greenbush, and they’re goin’ round by -the way of Damascus or Cherryfield, and leavin’ us to twiddle our thumbs. My -opinion, it’s hurt the town, too; Greenbush is deader’n a salted herrin’.”</p> - -<p>Small lifted a broganed foot and struck a match on the leg of his trousers, -after which he held it up until his wheezing pipe was lit.</p> - -<p>“Better not go makin’ that kind of talk in the hearin’ of Jedge Wiggin,” he -warned, pulling hard at the rebellious corncob. “If you done so, he’d tell you -what in a hurry, and you’d lose your badge so quick it’d make your head swim. -You know him, Silas. He ain’t got no use for automobiles nohow, and when he -announced that he perposed to enforce the speed regerlations without fear or -favor, he sartainly meant it. He’d slap a fine onter the President of the United -States if he was to go scootin’ through town faster’n the speed limit -allows.”</p> - -<p>“Mebbe he would,” said Buzzell. “He’s so hard-headed and sot it would be just -like him. Jest because he’s alwus been a hoss owner and a hoss-man, he’s down on -automobiles in gen’ral and ev’rybody that has anything to do with ’em. I reckon -that’s <i>why</i>he wants to be representative to the legislator, he wants to go -there to put through some kind of a bill to restrict the use of them merchines -to certain roads so that the drivers of hosses can have the other roads to -themselves. That’s jest how old-fashioned the jedge is.”</p> - -<p>“Lemme tell you somethin’, Silas,” said Constable Small, taking his pipe from -between his teeth and striking an impressive attitude with it. “They better let -him go. If the jedge don’t git the nomination from this deestrict, he’ll upset -their apple cart as sure as preachin’. There’ll be three candidates in the -primaries, and the party don’t want Rufe Crockett, for he’s a windbag, a -turncoat, and a flopper, and he’d be beat at the polls, just as he was four year -ago on the ticket of t’other party. But if Jedge Wiggin can’t win, I’ll bet you -a twenty-cent plug of War Hoss he turns his strength ag’inst Ephraim Glover, of -Palmyra, and throws the nomination to Crockett. This deestrict is the keystone, -and if the party loses it, they’ll most likely lose the whole county. I -understand the governor himself is ruther fretted over the situation, with the -primaries comin’ on next week.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t keer much about politics nohow,” declared Buzzell, wiping his eyes -again. “One party’s bad as t’other, and there ain’t neither of ’em done nothing -for me. Still I s’pose I’m expected to vote for the jedge jest because I -happened to be the most capable man they could find for this job. Nobody else I -know of wanted it. I took it because it promised to be a purty good thing, not -because I’m partic’ler agin’ automobilists. I’m goin’ to tell you my private -idee: I think Nathan Wiggin’s turned Greenbush into a graveyard by finin’ -ev’rybody ketched goin’ faster’n eight miles in the town limits. He’s give the -place a black eye and set people to dodgin’ it. He ain’t progressive, that’s ail -I got to say.”</p> - -<p>“And if you’ve got any sense left in your noodle you won’t go round -kow-wowing that kind of talk. If you did—— Hey! By gowdy! Here comes -a bubble over the hill! Git up! Git out your ticker and ketch him when he passes -the big elm. He’s hittin’ it up like a streak of greased quicksilver.”</p> - -<p>There was immediate action in the shade of the sumacs. With a sniffling -grunt, which held something both of protest and eagerness, Weeping Buzzell -heaved himself to his feet, fishing for his watch. On the fence Jeremiah Small -already had his timepiece in hand. His snaggy teeth gripped the pipestem; his -leathery face expressed the rapacity of the still hunter who has sighted -game.</p> - -<p>“Ready, now!” he cried. “Ketch him when I give the word. <i>Now!</i>”</p> - -<p>Down the winding road shot the automobile, trailing a cloud of dust behind -it. Besides the driver, a smoothfaced, bespectacled man of thirty, it contained -only one person, a stout, florid, worried-looking individual in the middle years -of life.</p> - -<p>“Careful, Hitchens!” warned the latter, as the man at the wheel made a turn -that barely prevented them from taking to the ditch. “You know you’re not used -to driving. Don’t pile us up.”</p> - -<p>“Don’t worry, sir,” returned the driver reassuringly. “You know you’ve got to -catch that train if you’re going to get to your office for the conference with -the chairman of the State committee. You’ll have to talk with old Wiggin over -the phone. No time to stop in Greenbush and chin with him now.”</p> - -<p>“We’ve got to pick up the boy in town. He must have got there twenty minutes -ago. We’re liable to meet him starting out after me with a hired car. Keep your -eyes peeled.”</p> - -<p>Around another curve careened the car, and struck the straight, gentle -incline running down into the village. Out from behind the sumacs dashed the -constables, Jeremiah Small planting himself in the very center of the highway, -one hand upflung authoritatively while the other flipped back his coat and -revealed the badge pinned to his left suspender. Silas Buzzell backed him up, -but with a shade more discretion about blocking the path of the speeding motor -car.</p> - -<p>“Stop!” shouted Constable Small. “In the name of the law I command you!”</p> - -<p>“Hold up!” wheezed Constable Buzzell. “Stop right where ye be!”</p> - -<p>“Pinched!” exclaimed the driver, in disgust and consternation.</p> - -<p>“Don’t stop! Go on!” rasped the florid-faced man at his side. Then he lifted -himself above the glass wind shield, flung up his gloved hands, and roared: -“Clear the road, you idiots! Out of the way! Get out!”</p> - -<p>Seeing the automobile whizzing straight at him without slackening speed to -any perceptible degree, Jeremiah Small cast his dignity to the winds and made a -leap for safety. Weeping Buzzell backed off the shoulder of the road, caught his -heel, and sat down amid the dusty grass of the shallow ditch. The car swished -past, the stout man relaxing on the seat, and tore on its way.</p> - -<p>“That’ll cost ye ten dollars more for defyin’ the majesty of the law!” -spluttered Small, shutting his eyes to prevent them from being filled with the -blinding cloud of dust flung over both officers. “The jedge alwus tucks on an -additional ten for that trick. Go it, you gay birds! The faster you drive, the -higher you’ll bounce when you hit the bumps. Come on, Silas! Deputy Newberry’ll -have that gay pair collared in two shakes of a lamb’s tail.”</p> - -<p>If the defiant autoists fancied they were to escape the clutches of the speed -regulators in that easy manner, they soon realized their error. Farther on -toward the village, running the full width of the road, were a series of -artfully arranged ridges and hollows calculated to give a severe shaking up to -the passengers of any motor car proceeding at a speed exceeding four or five -miles an hour.</p> - -<p>When this particular car struck those speed-killers, the two occupants were -shot into the air with great violence. Coming down, the car seemed to meet them -coming up, and the second and third bounces were worse than the first. Indeed, -it was little short of remarkable that the florid-faced passenger succeeded in -staying in the car at all. The driver, clinging desperately to the wheel, had a -better chance, although he found it extremely difficult. And ahead of them the -road undulated for a distance of several rods, like miniature waves of the -sea.</p> - -<p>“Ugh! Woogh! Woosh!” spluttered the older man, clutching wildly at the -bucking car. “What—in—Halifax! Shut her—unk!—down, -Hitchens! Stop her!”</p> - -<p>Hitchens struggled to obey, finally succeeding in throwing the clutch and -jamming on the brake. The wheels, locked, slid with a grinding sound that meant -money in the pocket of some tire manufacturer, the car bobbed and hobbled over -the ragged places, and the pursuing cloud of dust swooped down over them. When -the dust settled a little and they could catch their breath again, they beheld a -formidable, satisfied-looking man calmly mounting the right-hand running -board.</p> - -<p>“I’m the deputy sheruff of this town,” announced the individual who had -boarded them. “And you are took up for breaking the speed limit and defyin’ two -regler authorized officers of the law.”</p> - -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - -<h2 id='ch_V' title="Dispensing Justice."> - <span>CHAPTER V</span><br/>DISPENSING JUSTICE. -</h2> - -<p>The driver bristled with indignation.</p> - -<p>“It’s an outrage!” he cried. “We must get to Albion in time to catch the -three-forty train. You can’t stop us.”</p> - -<p>“I’ve stopped ye already,” said Deputy Sheriff Newberry serenely. “Under the -circumstances it don’t become you to tell me what I can’t do. You’ll be -permitted to proceed on your way to Albion after Jedge Wiggin attends to your -case. So you might as well soople down and take it calm.”</p> - -<p>“But you don’t understand, you don’t know who you’re holding up in this -high-handed fashion. You are interfering with——”</p> - -<p>“Wait, Hitchens!” cut in the other man, giving a glance at his watch. “Never -mind telling him who we are.”</p> - -<p>“’Tain’t necessary,” stated Newberry. “You’ll have to tell the jedge, -anyhow.”</p> - -<p>“How long,” asked the man with the watch, “will it require to get through -with this business so that we may go on. It is most important that we should get -that train.”</p> - -<p>“Wull,” drawled the deputy, “if the jedge is around handy, and he don’t read -you too long a lecture before he slaps on the fine, mebbe you’ll git started -ag’in in half or three-quarters of an hour; ’tain’t likely to be more’n an hour, -anyhow.”</p> - -<p>“Half an hour will make us miss the train. Can’t we fix it with you?”</p> - -<p>“Now take keer, take keer! Don’t you go for to offer no bribes to an officer -of the law. I couldn’t take them nohow,” he added as Constable Small came -hurrying up with Constable Buzzell wheezing and sniffling at his heels.</p> - -<p>“But,” protested Hitchens, “if you knew who——”</p> - -<p>“Never mind that,” interrupted the older man sharply. “The other business -will have to wait. I have a curiosity to see just how Judge Wiggin handles cases -of this sort.”</p> - -<p>“Your cur’osity,” assured Deputy Sheriff Newberry, swinging open the tonneau -door, “will be satisfied. Git in, boys!”</p> - -<p>When the three men had all piled into the rear of the car the one in command -directed Hitchens to drive straight down the long main street of the town, and -proceeded slowly.</p> - -<p>Their appearance in the village was the signal for various inhabitants who -observed them to grin and wag their heads, making uncomplimentary and derisive -remarks, while a number of small boys, hooting and laughing, assembled and -followed the car as far as Turner’s grocery, over which, in a bare and sparsely -furnished room, Judge Wiggin dispensed justice by mulcting the unfortunate -speeders who were arraigned before him. A number of idle citizens, who had been -gossiping and swapping stories on the store steps, rose at once and followed the -prisoners, conducted by Newberry and Buzzell, up the narrow back stairs to the -“courtroom.” Jeremiah Small had been sent to fetch the judge.</p> - -<p>The automobilists were given chairs facing a table which served as a desk, -and an anæmic-looking young man in horn-rimmed spectacles seated himself at the -table and began making out the complaint, having first questioned Buzzell about -the speed which the offenders had been making when they ran into the trap.</p> - -<p>“Your name?” inquired the clerk, turning to the older man.</p> - -<p>“Put down John Doe,” said the latter, “and Richard Roe,” he added, nodding -toward his companion. “I am the owner of the car. Richard was driving when we -were held up.”</p> - -<p>The younger man gave him a queer look, and leaned closer, whispering -something behind his hand. The answer was a grim smile and a shake of the head. -After slight hesitation, the clerk wrote down the names as given.</p> - -<p>The sound of heavy steps on the stairs preceded the entrance of Constable -Small, who announced that the judge was out somewhere, but that Willie Baker and -Nubby Snell had been sent scouting to find him.</p> - -<p>“I never heard of such an outrage!” exploded the intensely annoyed Hitchens. -“Somebody is going to regret this imposition. Time is valuable to us, -and——”</p> - -<p>“Don’t git flustered and fly off the handle, mister,” advised Deputy -Newberry, twisting off a quid of War Horse with his teeth and stowing it, -bulging, into his cheek with a tongue made dexterous by long practice. “It won’t -joggle things along no faster, and I ca’late you’ll be the one to do the -regrettin’ if you go shootin’ off a lot of loose talk. If you git sassy before -the jedge, I warn ye now that it’ll prob’ly land ye in the caboose. ‘Go slow’ is -a motter it’s best to toiler around here.”</p> - -<p>“Why don’t you tell them something?” persisted Hitchens, again appealing to -his companion.</p> - -<p>“What talking I decide to do will be done to the judge himself,” said the -older man.</p> - -<p>In the course of fifteen minutes Judge Wiggin appeared. He was a lean and -wiry man with a somewhat grim jaw and a steely blue eye. There was dignity in -his manner. He scarcely glanced at the prisoners as he seated himself at the -table opposite the clerk and adjusted his spectacles to read the complaint.</p> - -<p>“Hats off!” he ordered, rapping with his knuckles. “John Doe and Richard Roe, -by the complaint of a deputy sheriff and two constables, by the town of -Greenbush duly and legally authorized, you are hereby charged with catawamping a -hossless vehicle over a public highway, lying within the town limits, at a speed -of forty miles an hour, thereby rupturing the law made and provided, and -wantonly and willfully endangering the peace and safety of other persons who -might find it necessary to locomote upon said highway.</p> - -<p>“According to the complaint,” the judge continued, “the before-mentioned -Richard Roe was the driver, and the before-mentioned John Doe the owner, of said -hossless vehicle at the time of the infraction of said law. That being the fact, -the penalty administered, in case the charge is admitted or proven, will be -applied in full to the person who was engaged in piloting the juggernaut when -you was nabbed. And let me add that in this court, with the exception of the -judge presiding, unnecessary talk is a luxury, and luxuries add to the high cost -of living. A word to the wise is a seed sown upon good ground that springeth up -and beareth the fruit of economy. Richard Roe, guilty or not guilty?”</p> - -<p>Biting his lip with annoyance, the younger of the two prisoners started to -protest: “It was necessary—er—your honor, that we should catch the -westward-bound train at Albion. If you were aware who we are, who your petty -officers, hiding like highwaymen in ambush, had ventured to hold -up——”</p> - -<p>Again Judge Wiggin’s knuckles smote the desk. “Apparently,” he said, “my -observation regarding the expense of unnecessary talk in this court failed to -sink in, or even to make a dent. No excuse of private necessity condones -infractions of the law. Your careless remark, as well as the suspicious nature -of the names you have given, leads me to believe that you are pirooting around -the country under false colors, and makes it rather probable that you are old -offenders trying in that way to dodge the extreme penalty the court might see -fit to administer if your real identities was known. I shall bear this in mind -in passing sentence.”</p> - -<p>The grinning spectators tittered guardedly. The older man reached out and -placed a hand on his companion’s knee.</p> - -<p>“You can see that you are simply making matters worse,” he whispered. -“Anything you may say will be used against us. Plead guilty at once.”</p> - -<p>Squirming and rebellions, Hitchens complied. However, instead of passing -sentence without delay, the judge squared away on his chair, locked the fingers -of his hands before him, and proceeded to read the culprits a lengthy lecture -anent the rights of the common people upon the highways and the outrageous and -criminal manner in which these rights were disregarded by automobilists in -general.</p> - -<p>During this scathing harangue he scarcely looked at either of the impatient -and suffering victims, but kept his gaze fixed, for the most part, on the -rafters above their heads. He was the possessor of a fluent flow of language, -and a somewhat homely native wit that was keen and stinging; and certain it was -that his vituperation was in no degree delicately barbed. Even the -self-restraint of the elder man was tested to the limit.</p> - -<p>And presently, when the fine of twenty-five dollars and -costs—twenty-eight dollars and thirty cents, all told—had been -inflicted and paid over, the owner of the motor car released the safety -valve.</p> - -<p>“Judge Wiggin,” he said, “I’m compelled to tell you that it has never been my -misfortune to witness a greater farce or a more ridiculous travesty of justice. -You made it absolutely evident that, from the very beginning, your mind was made -up and that you would impose a fine, regardless of extenuating circumstances. -You practically warned us that any attempt at defense would merely increase the -sum of money you were determined to get out of us. Such narrow-minded bigotry -stamps you as a man unfit to represent this district in the legislature.”</p> - -<p>Nathan Wiggin bent a grim and steady eye upon him. “And them few remarks,” he -returned placidly, “constitute a clear case of contempt, for which I shall have -to tuck on another twenty-five dollars, to preserve the dignity of the court. -However, considering the fact that the last time I heard you speak from the -stump you shot off a whole lot of balderdash, for all of which the so-called -intelligent voters of this State saw fit to elect you governor, I’ll remit the -fine. And discretion being the better part of valor, let me suggest that you -bottle up further seething criticism until we both get outside, where, as man to -man, we can tell each other jest what we think, without mincin’ words.”</p> - -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - -<h2 id='ch_VI' title="A Demonstration Postponed."> - <span>CHAPTER VI</span><br/>A DEMONSTRATION POSTPONED. -</h2> - -<p>A bombshell, exploding in that room, could hardly have created a greater -sensation. The governor! The governor of the State, arrested for speeding in the -little town of Greenbush, had been fined by Judge Wiggin, who, as a would-be -candidate for the legislature, required the support and votes in his district of -the governor’s own party!</p> - -<p>Further than that, more extraordinary, more incomprehensible, having -immediately recognized the governor as one of the two offenders, the judge had -dared to reprimand him precisely as if he were an ordinary citizen; possibly -with a trifle more caustic severity. And Nat Wiggin was altogether too shrewd -and long-headed not to realize that a single word from the chief executive of -the State would be almost certain to blast his political ambitions.</p> - -<p>Nevertheless, a little calm thought would have led Wiggin’s neighbors there -assembled to realize that his fearless action was precisely what they might have -expected of him. Never in his life had he played the toady, and he was not a -person to cringe in the presence of power and pomp. “Without fear or favor” was -his motto, and, right or wrong, he adhered to it. Hard-headed and obstinate he -might be, but he was not inconsistent.</p> - -<p>The spectators crowded forward on tiptoe, gaping, almost aghast. Frowning and -grim, his face purple with anger, the governor stared at the judge. Calm and -unperturbed as a June morning, the latter announced that court was adjourned, -and rose from his seat. Trembling with deepest indignation, the governor’s -secretary pulled at his elbow.</p> - -<p>“Come,” urged Hitchens in a low tone, “let’s get out before I lose control of -myself and twist that old lunatic’s nose.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t think you’d better try that, here or elsewhere, under any -provocation,” returned the chief executive. “I’ve a notion he’d take as much -pleasure in fighting as in fining a speeder.”</p> - -<p>They turned toward the stairs, the spectators, still staring wide-eyed, -clattering back to open a lane through which they could pass. Weeping Buzzell -was ahead of them, galvanized into unusual and amazing activity.</p> - -<p>“Make way for the governor!” he snuffled, waving his arms.</p> - -<p>Down the stairs in advance he stumped, bursting with eagerness to carry the -news to those apathetic townsmen who had not been drawn by curiosity to the -courtroom. Marvelous and incredible was the swiftness with which that news -spread. Small boys carried it, scurrying. The governor had been nabbed for -breaking the speed limit; Judge Wiggin had reprimanded and fined him. Villagers -of both sexes and all ages came hurrying toward Turner’s store, anxious to get a -glimpse of the notable who had met such summary and impartial treatment at the -hands of the “jedge.” Hitchens saw them assembling.</p> - -<p>“Let’s get out of this hole,” he urged. “All the jays in the town will be -here in less than ten minutes.” He made for the automobile, which stood in front -of the store, headed down the street.</p> - -<p>“We’ve got to find George,” said the governor, following. “It’s odd he hasn’t -shown up. Wonder what’s become of him.”</p> - -<p>As they paused irresolutely beside the motor car the judge, having issued -forth, approached. There was nothing placating or apologetic in his manner, nor -did he wear an offensive, defiant air.</p> - -<p>“Governor,” he said, “if you’d seen fit to notify me by telefone that -business of importance made it necessary for you to go skihooting through this -town, I’d have had the speed limit raised to fifty miles an hour for the -occasion, and the officers keepin’ an open and clear road for ye. But when you -was ketched, and hauled up before me, same as any other private person, and give -a fictitious name, I figgered there was only one way to handle the case, which -was the same as I’d handle any other. I’m agin’ these here highway locomotives -on principle, and I’d fine the Czar of Roosia if he was took up for speeding in -one within the limits of this town.”</p> - -<p>Something like a faint smile began to play around the corners of the -governor’s mouth. “How many times have you ridden in an automobile, Judge -Wiggin?” he asked.</p> - -<p>“Jest about as many times as you’ve rid on the tail of a comet, governor. A -good, fast-steppin’ hoss suits me.”</p> - -<p>“Exactly. And you’ve driven some fast steppers in your time. No doubt you’ve -driven them through the streets of this town at a much greater speed than eight -miles an hour, thus endangering the lives of pedestrians and others upon the -highways.”</p> - -<p>“Endangerin’ fiddlesticks! I know how to handle hosses, sir. I’ve broke and -trained hundreds of ’em in my day. I know how to guide ’em and how to stop -’em.”</p> - -<p>“Still you may not realize that an expert driver of a motor car has far more -perfect control over his machine than the driver of a spirited horse can -possibly have over the animal. Likewise, an auto moving at the same relative -speed as a horse attached to a carriage may be stopped more quickly than the -horse. Therefore the machine, properly handled, is a smaller menace to human -safety than a horse-drawn carriage.”</p> - -<p>“Governor,” said Nathan P. Wiggin, “politeness forbids me to tell you jest -what I think of that statement. Besides, I’ve got my coat on.”</p> - -<p>“If you’re too prejudiced,” said the governor, “get into this car with me, -and you shall have a demonstration.” Just how this invitation would have been -received at that moment cannot be said. Through the crowd came a panting, -freckled, red-headed young man, flinging people aside with his long arms.</p> - -<p>“Hey, Jedge Wiggin!” he called chokingly. “Bessie’s gone crazy! Come home -quick!”</p> - -<p>“Whut’s that, Lem Dodd?” cried the judge, snapping round and grabbing the -young man by the shoulder. “My darter—gone crazy? What d’ye mean?”</p> - -<p>“Jest whut I say,” insisted Lem Dodd chokingly. “She brung a strange young -feller inter the house, and he’s got a crack on his cabeza, and he keeled over -on the parlor sofy, and he looked like he was a goner, with his eyes shet, and -she hollered and flopped on her knees beside him, and called him ‘Reginal’ and -‘dear,’ and called herself a murderer, and kissed him right slap on the kisser.” -He caught his breath with a gulping sound of distress. “And when Miss Sally -asked her who he was, she said she didn’t know, and he don’t b’long round these -parts, for I never see him before, and she’s crazy as a June bug or she’d never -do no such thing.”</p> - -<p>“This,” said the judge, “is a case for immejiate investigation. Under the -circumstances, governor, we’ll have to postpone that demonstration till some -future date.”</p> - -<p>Then he set off for his home, a short distance up the street, accompanied by -the agitated and urgent Lemuel Dodd.</p> - -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - -<h2 id='ch_VII' title="A Novice at the Wheel."> - <span>CHAPTER VII</span><br/>A NOVICE AT THE WHEEL. -</h2> - -<p>The governor and Hitchens made inquiry of the crowd regarding their missing -driver, but no one present seemed to have seen the man. Presently the governor -turned to his secretary.</p> - -<p>“You don’t imagine,” he asked in a low tone, “that the young man who is -injured in Judge Wiggin’s house can be George?”</p> - -<p>“The girl called him Reginald, according to that fellow who brought word to -the judge.”</p> - -<p>“Still, I’ve got a queer notion that it may be the boy. Let’s investigate.” -When they reached Wiggin’s front door, George, a bandage tied round his head, -was just coming out, followed by the judge, who seemed to be highly disturbed -and indignant.</p> - -<p>“I’m all right now, governor,” called the young man reassuringly. “A -disagreeable bull helped me over a fence, and I sort of collapsed after walking -into town.”</p> - -<p>“Governor,” said Nathan Wiggin grimly, “as near as I can find out, your -shuffer climbed a tree to git away from a toothless, half-blind old shepherd -dog, and run like the devil when Libby’s bull took after him. Then he follered -my darter home, and walked right into the house arter her. Whuther or not he was -shammin’ when he flopped on the sofy with his eyes shet, Bessie was upsot and -made a touse over him. She’s a ruther emotional girl. My sister’s lookin’ after -her now, and I’ve told her what I think of shuffers in gen’ral and young men -that climb trees to get away from dogs without teeth enough to dent a -biscuit.”</p> - -<p>The governor laughed. “There may be an excuse for the young man,” he said. -“He was bitten by a vicious dog when very young, but I don’t think bulls could -scare him much.” He put his arm across the shoulders of the young man. “Are you -sure you’re not hurt much, George?”</p> - -<p>“Well, not on the head,” was the reply. “But that girl came pretty near -finishing me. She’s a perfect witch, and I——”</p> - -<p>“Such a statement concerning my darter is slanderous, considering the fuss -she made over him,” said Judge Wiggin in deep resentment. “But I don’t s’pose -it’s anything more than could be expected of an ordinary shuffer.”</p> - -<p>Again the governor laughed in a peculiar way. “Perhaps not,” he admitted, -turning back to the judge. “I’d like to convince you, however, that my argument -about automobiles was right, and, as long as you prevented me from catching my -train after I had spent three hours persuading Ephraim Glover, of Palmyra, to -withdraw and not contest you in the primaries, I think it is up to you to give -me the chance.”</p> - -<p>First Nathan Wiggin looked astonished, and then slowly his face turned -red.</p> - -<p>“Was that whut brought you inter these parts?” he asked.</p> - -<p>“That was the principal business. Glover was so hard to handle that I was -delayed until it was only possible for me to get back by train in time for an -important meeting to-night.” Judge Wiggin’s embarrassment was painful. -“Governor,” he said, “circumstances alter cases. I’m ruther sorry circumstances -interfered with that important app’intment of yours. But whinin’ never stopped a -blister from smarting, and it’s too late to dodge after you’ve been jabbed by -the business end of a hornet. Although I’ve said I’d never set foot in one of -them gas-wagon contraptions, considering who’s invited me, if you’ll agree to -proceed circumspect and decorous within the town limits, and promise to land me -back here safe and sound, I’m going to take you up.”</p> - -<p>“Done,” accepted Governor Bradley. “Come along, judge.”</p> - -<p>Back to Turner’s grocery, where the bigger part of the curious crowds still -hovered around the touring car, they went, the governor walking arm in arm with -Nathan Wiggin, greatly to the wonderment of the staring throng.</p> - -<p>“I want you to sit on the forward seat so that you can watch the driver -operate the car, judge,” said the governor, opening one of the forward doors. -“Get in!”</p> - -<p>The incredulous and bewildered spectators gasped when the judge complied -without a murmur to this invitation. Lem Dodd had said that Bessie Wiggin had -gone crazy, and now it seemed that Bessie’s father was ready for a padded -cell.</p> - -<p>“Wull, what d’ye think o’ that?” mumbled old Abner Nutter, poking his thumb -into the ribs of Joshua Philbrook. “The jedge—goin’ bubble ridin’ arter -he’s swore a hundred times that there wasn’t money enough in the United States -treasury to hire him to set in one o’ them berjiggered things. I’ve heerd him -say it with my own two ears.”</p> - -<p>“They’ve hippynotized him,” was Philbrook’s opinion. “Nothin’ else explains -it. He ain’t in his right mind.”</p> - -<p>“Perhaps you’d better let Hitchens drive, George,” said the governor, -addressing the injured young man. “I declare, you’re pale! Sure you’re not badly -hurt?”</p> - -<p>“Somehow walking makes me dizzy,” was the answer. “Still, I’m feeling better. -I think I’ll step into this store and get a drink of water.”</p> - -<p>Having become suddenly anxious, the chief executive followed him into the -store. Hitchens, fretful and none too well pleased with the governor for wasting -so much time on Wiggin, left the latter sitting in the car and mounted the store -steps.</p> - -<p>Aware that the accusing eyes of his fellow townsmen were upon him, Nathan -Wiggin gave his attention to the mechanism of the car as displayed before him. -He examined the levers and pedals, squinted at the clock and the speedometer and -the gasoline gauge. He wondered at the numerous contrivances of push buttons and -small levers on the dash. He even bent forward and curiously moved one of the -latter from one side to the other. About that time a bold urchin who had climbed -on the running board released the emergency brake.</p> - -<p>It was a cry of warning from somebody in the crowd that made Judge Wiggin -aware that the car was moving. It had been standing on a gentle incline, with -its nose pointing down the long main street, and had started as soon as the -brake was set free.</p> - -<p>“Hey!” shouted an excited voice. “She’s goin’! Jump, jedge!”</p> - -<p>Nathan Wiggin did not jump. He was not greatly alarmed at first. The thing -had barely started; it was not running away. He had broken and trained vicious -horses that other men could do nothing with, some of them veritable man-killers, -and surely he could stop an inanimate contrivance like a motor car, especially -when it was not under power. Possibly he was restrained also by a conviction -that he could not abandon the car with dignity, and by the knowledge that to -abandon it at all under such circumstances would possibly make him an object of -ridicule. He knew with what keen gusto the Greenbushers “harped on a joke” and -nagged the victim thereof.</p> - -<p>“Whoa!” said the judge, moving quickly over into the driver’s seat and -grasping the wheel. “Whoa back!”</p> - -<p>The car moved on, those persons who had been in front of it hastily -scrambling out of the way. The judge braced hard with one foot against the -clutch pedal, but that did not seem to have any effect. He grabbed one of the -levers, thinking it might be the brake, and gave it a yank. It was the lever -that manipulated the gears. At the same time his foot slipped off the clutch -pedal.</p> - -<p>Thrown into gear, the moving car cranked itself, and the engine leaped to -life with a sudden vibrating hum. For in shifting the tiny lever on the dash -Judge Wiggin had made connections with the magneto. The surprised man gasped as -the machine gave a sudden forward lunge, like a horse beneath the stinging cut -of a whip. Almost before he could gasp twice, the confounded thing was running -away.</p> - -<p>“Whoa!” shouted the dismayed man commandingly, surging back on the wheel with -all his strength. “If the bit holds, I’ll break your jaw, you——”</p> - -<p>One foot was planted on the accelerator, jamming it down and opening the -throttle wide. The engine roared beneath the quivering hood. The car made a jump -that seemed to take all four wheels off the ground. Judge Wiggin’s hat flew off, -his sparse gray hair stood on end, his eyes bulged; but between his parted, -drawn-back lips his teeth were set. Behind him he heard the horrified shouts of -the crowd, through which Hitchens had vainly tried to plow a path in time to -board the machine before it could get beyond his reach. Realizing he had failed, -Hitchens stopped and flung up his arms in despair.</p> - -<p>“The old fool!” he groaned. “He’ll smash the car! He’ll be killed!”</p> - -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - -<h2 id='ch_VIII' title="Worse than a Wild Horse."> - <span>CHAPTER VIII</span><br/>WORSE THAN A WILD HORSE. -</h2> - -<p>Annoyed and amazed by the inexplicable and cantankerous behavior of the -automobile, Nathan Wiggin was, at the same time, aroused to resentment and -wrath. The confounded thing was acting exactly like a wild, viciously ugly, -unbroken colt. Immediately the judge’s fighting blood rose. He was stirred by -the tingling joy of contest; it throbbed in every vein of his body. Still -holding the throttle wide open with one foot, he planted the other on the brake, -and sawed at the wheel.</p> - -<p>The things the automobile did then made it seem more than ever like a strong -and furious young horse battling against restraint and mastery. It bucked and -plunged in jerky jumps; it “pitched fence-cornered” from side to side, after the -style of a Western broncho; it snorted and choked and snorted again.</p> - -<p>“Whoa, you dratted catamaran!” snarled the judge. “You’ve gotter whoa or I’ll -take your jaw off!”</p> - -<p>Only for the down grade he might have stalled the engine before the racking -of the car caused his foot to fly off the brake pedal. When that happened, it -continued on its way down the hill toward the wooden bridge that spanned the -Swampscott River, swaying from one side of the road to the other. At times it -threatened to climb trees or telephone poles, or crash through fences and plunge -like a battering-ram into the fronts of houses or stores. But always the crazy -machine swerved in time to avoid disaster, and shot across to the other side of -the road.</p> - -<p>When his right hand slipped from the wheel, the judge grabbed the side of the -car body, and his clutching thumb jammed down the button that operated the -electric siren. The button stuck, and the siren howled like a doomed demon of -despair, causing Nathan Wiggin’s hair to stand up stiff as the bristles on a -horse brush.</p> - -<p>The fearsome sound of the wailing whistle brought people running to windows -to behold a sight no one in Greenbush had ever expected to see—Judge -Wiggin driving an automobile! To say that he was driving it more than borders on -hyperbole; it would be far closer to the truth to state that it was driving -him—frantic! He was not habitually a profane man, but he possessed a broad -vocabulary of vigorous expletives of a more or less impious nature; and it must -be admitted that the language he addressed to that motor car would have shocked -a parson. Those who dashed to their windows in time to see him shoot zigzagging -past beheld a man that was little short of raving mad.</p> - -<p>Hens that had been scratching peacefully in the village street fled, -squawking. Barking furiously, a yellow dog charged out. The car leaped at the -animal, struck it with one forward wheel, and sent it, spinning and howling, -into the gutter.</p> - -<p>Deaf as a doormat, old Betsy Tucker, going to market with a hand basket -containing two dozen eggs, neither saw nor heard until the runaway auto was -perilously close upon her and the judge was howling like a maniac for her to -“clear the road.” Then she gave a yell and threw up her arms, flinging basket -and eggs into the air. She was saved by sheer luck, for the judge, plunging at -the wheel, turned the machine so that it missed her by less than a foot. The -basket came down, bottom up, on Nathan Wiggin’s head, and the eggs—well, -for some moments thereafter the judge could not have seen to drive, had he -possessed the required skill. From his shoulders up he resembled the initial -preparation of an omelet.</p> - -<p>“Holy sassafras!” he spluttered. “It’s raining fish glue! Everything happens -at once!”</p> - -<p>As soon as he could blink a pair of peepholes through that golden -film—he did not dare let go with his hands to wipe his eyes—he saw -that the foot of the hill was almost reached, and that the bridge across the -peacefully flowing river lay just ahead. It was not a very wide bridge, and -Tobias Blaisdell, perched on a load of hay drawn by two horses, was just driving -on to the far end.</p> - -<p>“Back up, you blinkety-blank jay-hawker!” yelled the judge. “Make a clear -passage or I’ll bore a tunnel in ye!”</p> - -<p>Had he been less excited he would have realized that it was much too late for -such a cumbersome obstruction to get out of the way. Blaisdell had time only to -check his horses and stare in horror at the shrieking engine of destruction that -was charging upon him. He did not recognize Nathan Wiggin in the egg-bespattered -wild man who seemed to be guiding the humming mechanism of disaster, but he knew -that, in about four seconds, unless a miracle intervened, horses, motor car, -hay, and human beings were going to be mixed in a spectacular and tragic -smash.</p> - -<p>Then, as the uncontrolled automobile reached the middle span of the bridge, -the miracle took place. Shooting suddenly to one side, the machine struck the -wooden railing, and went through it as if it had been constructed of clay -pipestems. Into the deepest part of the river it plunged, flinging up a great -sulash of spray, and disappeared from view. Nathan Wiggin, of Greenbush, -vanished with it.</p> - -</div> - -<div class='chapter'> - -<h2 id='ch_IX' title="When the Limit Came Off."> - <span>CHAPTER IX</span><br/>WHEN THE LIMIT CAME OFF. -</h2> - -<p>The shouts of the startled crowd in front of Turner’s grocery had brought -those within the store rushing out to learn the cause of alarm. The governor -came with them, followed a second later by the young man who had been tossed by -Libby’s bull. They beheld the motor car well under way, and the judge struggling -frantically and ineffectually to restrain it.</p> - -<p>“Great guns!” groaned the governor, turning pale. “Wiggin’s started the -demonstration on his own hook. He’ll smash a four-thousand-dollar car and his -neck at the same time!”</p> - -<p>The young man with the bandaged head stiffened. If he felt weak or dizzy at -that moment, he flung it off instantly. With a single bound he was at the foot -of the store steps, against which leaned a bicycle, left there temporarily by -some one. He grabbed the bicycle, uttering a ringing shout for everybody to get -out of the way.</p> - -<p>Through the scattered crowd he dashed, leaping to the saddle and catching the -pedals with his nimble feet. Bending over the handlebars, he started in pursuit -of the automobile, which, by this time, was halfway down the hill, with the -wailing siren in full blast.</p> - -<p>Continuing to jabber and shout, the crowd followed, stringing out in a -straggling line. Boys and younger men were in the lead. Middle-aged, -bewhiskered, bald-headed men came next. The rear guard was made up of the aged -and decrepit; the very last one of all, bent with rheumatism, and hobbling with -the aid of two canes, being Zebediah Titcomb, the sage of Greenbush.</p> - -<p>Never since its foundation had the sleepy town of Greenbush beheld such a -spectacle. Never in its history had there been such tremendous excitement within -its boundaries. The end of all things terrestrial could scarcely have created a -greater hullabaloo in that torpid community.</p> - -<p>The young man on the bicycle was not able to overtake the runaway motor car -before it reached the bridge, but he was not far behind it. When the automobile -smashed through the railing and leaped into the river, he jumped from the -bicycle and followed it without the slightest hesitation.</p> - -<p>He was an excellent swimmer, and, rising from the plunge, he saw the head of -Nathan Wiggin bob to the surface within reach of his arm. Immediately he -fastened a hand on the man’s collar.</p> - -<p>“Keep still! Stop thrashing,” he said, “and I’ll get you out.”</p> - -<p>The somewhat difficult task of rescuing Judge Wiggin from drowning was -accomplished, while the panting throng that had reached the bridge looked on and -cheered. Reaching shallow water, the young man assisted the judge to his feet, -and both waded forth to dry land.</p> - -<p>Arriving on shore, the older man immediately sat down facing the river, -beneath the sluggish surface of which Governor Bradley’s automobile lay -immersed. After a few choking gulps, he began to speak in accents and words of -the utmost self-contempt.</p> - -<p>“Nate Wiggin,” he said, addressing himself, “you’ve lived to be fifty-four -year old, and arrived at the conclusion that there wasn’t anything that traveled -on legs or wheels that you couldn’t handle. Which goes to show that when a man -thinks he knows all there is to know about anything a shrinkage has set in about -half an inch beneath the roots of his hair. A wise fool is about as safe to have -round as a stick of dynamite bakin’ in the oven of a red-hot stove. If he don’t -damage nobody else, he’s pretty likely to blow up and bust himself.”</p> - -<p>The governor and his secretary, followed by a few others, came hurrying to -the spot. Seeing them approach, the judge got upon his feet, dripping tiny -rivulets.</p> - -<p>“Governor,” he observed, “there’s no great loss without some small gain. -You’ll save the price of a wash for that there automobile. Whatever damage or -expense may accrue I ca’late I’ll have to sustain. I guess we can find a way to -get her out.”</p> - -<p>“I’m thankful,” said Governor Bradley, “that you were not killed.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t see why that should choke you with joy. In your place I’d prob’ly be -so blazin’ mad I’d start in to murder somebody.”</p> - -<p>His eyes streaming and his nose snuffling, Weeping Buzzell broke in: “Obadiah -Cobb has come along with his hoss and wagon. He’s right there at the end of the -bridge, and he’ll take ye home, jedge. You better git outer them wet clothes it -you don’t want to ketch your everlarsting.”</p> - -<p>“I’m no wetter’n this young feller who yanked me outer the drink,” said the -judge. “He’s got to come along to the house with me and get fixed up. And you, -too, governor, and t’other gentleman—you come; I insist on it. You’re -going to stop with me, the whole caboodle of ye, to supper. Hosspitality -deferred may be hosspitality soured, but I’ll guarantee to do my best to sweeten -it up on this occasion.”</p> - -<p>By this time it seemed that by far the greater portion of the inhabitants of -the town were packed upon the bridge or jamming the roadway. And when Obadiah -Cobb took the governor, the judge, and the other two men into his double seater -and started back up the hill with them, the crowd laughed and cheered again.</p> - -<p>“Governor,” said Judge Wiggin, “I dunno whether that’s meant for you or for -the young man who hauled me out of the stream, but either way it’s proper well -deserved. If you hadn’t been dead game, you’d have kicked like a steer over -what’s happened, and if he wasn’t good grit to the bone he’d never have gone -into the river arter me. Which is admittin’ I made a mistake in sizing him up -when I found my darter making a touse over him.”</p> - -<p>Among the few villagers who remained unaware of the recent lively events were -Judge Wiggin’s sister and his daughter. Of course they were thrown into a great -flutter. Miss Sally said: “My stars!” What Miss Bessie said was whispered into -the ear of the water-soaked but smiling young man, who gave her a look and a sly -squeeze of the hand that brought a rosy flush to her cheeks.</p> - -<p>Dry clothes were found; also “a little nip of something to parry off chills.” -Warming up, the participants in the adventure joked and laughed, even though the -judge seemed to have something on his mind that was giving him some serious -thought. What this was appeared later after they had partaken of a genuine -old-fashioned New England supper, topped off with doughnuts and hot apple pie -and steaming, fragrant coffee.</p> - -<p>Turning his eyes to the governor, who sat at the right of Miss Sally, Nathan -Wiggin said: “Governor, putting aside the question of damages I owe on account -of what happened to your automobile, ca’late it’s up to me to express my -appreciation of whut you done to induce Ephraim Glover to take back and give me -a clear field. With a clear start, I reckon I can carry this deestrict, and help -you to carry the county. Anyhow, I’m going to lay myself out to do it.”</p> - -<p>“That sounds good to me,” laughed the governor.</p> - -<p>“Furthermore,” pursued the host, “I’ve decided to abolish the trapping of -automobile drivers in this here town. Mebbe,” he admitted, “this may appear a -leetle dite selfish on my part as, havin’ got my dander up by the pranks played -on me by that there gas go-cart of yourn, governor, I’m contemplating buying one -myself and running the consarned cantraption until I git it tamed. If there was -traps hereabouts, mebbe I’d git took up and have to fine myself for busting the -speed limit. Therefore, henceforth there ain’t going to be no speed limit in -Greenbush.”</p> - -<p>Beneath the edge of the table, old Shep, attempting to lick Bessie’s hand -with his tongue, licked also the hand of the young man who sat beside her. And -before sitting down, the young people had found an opportunity, quite -unobserved, to exchange a few words in private. Somehow neither of them had -evinced any great desire for food, but while George was still unnaturally pale, -the roses continued to bloom in Bessie’s cheeks.</p> - -<p>Now George spoke up boldly: “As long as you have abolished the speed limit, -Judge Wiggin, I am going to improve the occasion to ask you for your daughter’s -hand in marriage. Doubtless it will seem rather hasty to you, but everything has -moved with a rush this afternoon. I have put the question to Bessie, and won her -consent.”</p> - -<p>The governor stared. Miss Nancy nearly fainted. Bessie Wiggin trembled -visibly. Nathan P. Wiggin gazed hard at the young man for about thirty seconds, -and then scratched his chin, a queer pucker screwing up his face.</p> - -<p>“Wull, I declare!” said the judge at last. “That is going some! Never quite -reckoned on my darter hookin’ up with a shuffer, but, having saved me from -drownding, you’ve took me at a disadvantage. If Bessie has said yes, and you kin -furnish the proper creedenshuls I’ll have to take your proposition under -consideration, I guess.”</p> - -<p>The governor looked Bessie Wiggin over appraisingly, and decided that he had -made no mistake in thinking her an unusually pretty and charming young lady.</p> - -<p>“It is sudden,” he said, laughing softly, “and it would not have happened if -George had not offered to drive for me to-day, my regular chauffeur being ill. -In the way of credentials, judge, let me state that he is my son.”</p> - -<p>The judge’s sister sat bolt upright in a jiffy. The judge coughed behind his -hand, the pucker crinkling the corners of his eyes.</p> - -<p>“Them creedenshuls, governor,” he stated, “are wholly satisfactory to me.” -His whole body seemed to shake oddly. “I’m afraid I’m going to have a chill, -after all,” he added. “I think the governor and me had better take a little walk -in the moonlight.”</p> - -<p style='text-align:center; margin-top:1.6em; font-size:0.8em; text-indent:0'>THE END</p> - -</div> - -<div style='font-size:0.9em; border:1px solid silver; margin-top:1em; -margin-left:10%; width:80%; padding-left:0.8em;'> -<p style='text-indent:0'>Transcriber’s Note: This story appeared in the May 1, 1915 issue of the <em>Top-Notch</em> magazine published by Street & Smith Company.</p> -</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SHAMING THE SPEED LIMIT ***</div> -<div style='text-align:left'> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will -be renamed. -</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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