The Dominant Dollar Part 31

The cookies, far-famed and seemingly always available, were on hand, and Roberts relapsed into silence. From her own seat behind them Elice Gleason sat looking at the two men, precisely as she had looked that first evening they had called in company.

"That's a new motor out there, isn't it?" she asked at last.

"Yes." Roberts roused and shook the scattered crumbs off his khaki coat.

"It came while I was away. This is the first try-out."

Miss Gleason was examining the big machine with a critical eye. "This is a six-cylinder, I judge. What's become of the old four, Old--"

"Reliable?"

"Yes."

"Disgraced its name." Roberts smiled peculiarly. "I took it along with me when I went West. It's sc.r.a.pped out there on the Nevada desert, G.o.d knows where, thirty miles from nowhere. I fancy the vultures are wondering right now what in the world it is."

"You had an accident?"

"Rather." Roberts got to his feet deliberately. "Some other time I'll tell you the story, if you wish. It would take too long now, and it's entirely too hot here." He looked at his two listeners impartially.

"Besides, there's other business more urgent. I have a curiosity to see how quickly the six-eighty out there will eat up thirty miles. It's guaranteed to do it in twenty-five minutes. Won't you come along?

"I'll take the rumble and you two sit forward," he added as they hesitated. "You can drive as well as I can, Elice."

"Not to-day; some other time," declined Armstrong, hurriedly. He started up to avoid a change of purpose, and to cover any seeming precipitancy lit a cigarette with deliberation. "I was going, really, anyway."

Roberts did not insist, nor did he dissimulate.

"As you wish. I meant it or I shouldn't have made the suggestion. Better glue on your hair if you accept, Elice. I have a presentiment that I'll let her out to-day." He started down the walk. "I'm ready when you are."

Behind him the man and the girl exchanged one look.

"Come, Steve," said the girl in a low voice. "I ask it."

"No," Armstrong's thin face formed a smile, a forced, crooked smile; "I meant what I said, too, or I wouldn't have refused. Likewise I also have a presentiment--of a different kind. Good-bye."

"Steve!"

"No."

And that was all.

Out in the long street, University Row, glided the big red roadster; slowly through the city limits, more rapidly through the suburbs, then, as the open country beyond came to view, it began gradually to find itself.

"Want to see her go, do you, Elice?" asked Roberts, as the town behind them grew indistinct in a fog of dust.

"Yes, if you wish."

"If I wish." Roberts brought the goggles down from his forehead significantly. "If I wish," he repeated, the inflection peculiar. He looked ahead. The broad prairie road, dust white in its July whiteness, stretched straight out before them, without a turn or a curve, direct as the crow flies for forty miles, and on through two counties, as he knew.

A light wind, begot of their motion alone, played on their faces, mingled with the throbbing purr of the engine in their ears. "If I wish," for the third time; and notch by notch the throttle began to open.

On they went, the self-evolved breeze a gale now, the throb of the big motor a continuous moan, the cloud of dust behind them a dull brown bank against the sky. On they went over convex grades that tilted gently first to the right, then to the left, over culverts that spoke one single note of protest, over tiny bridges that echoed hollow at the impact; past dazzling green cornfields and yellow blocks of ripening grain, through great shadows of homestead groves and clumps of willows that marked the lowest point of swales, on--on--

Roberts leaned over close, but his eyes did not leave the road for the fraction of a second.

"Afraid, girl?" he asked.

"No."

Again the man looked ahead. They were fair in the open now, already far from the city. It was the heat of a blistering Sunday and not a team or a pedestrian was astir. Ahead, for a mile, for miles perhaps, as far as they could see, not an animate dot marred the surface of the taut, stretched, yellow-white ribbon.

"Shall I let her out, Elice?"

"Yes."

"Sure you're not afraid--in the least?"

"Certain."

Again the throttle lever and its companion spark began to move around the tiny s.e.xtant, approaching nearer and nearer. Simultaneously, sympathetic, as though actuated by the same power, the hand of the speedometer on the dash began to crawl up and up. They had been all but racing before; but now--

Behind them the cloud of dust rose higher and higher, and darker and darker as the suction increased. To either side was no longer yellow and green distinct, but a mingling, indistinct, mottled unreality. Ahead the ribbon of yellow and white seemed to rise up and throw itself into their faces; again and again endlessly. The engine no longer moaned. It roared as a fire under draft. The wind was a wall that held them back like a vise in their places. In the flash of a glance the man looked at the face of the dial. The single arm was pasted black over the numeral sixty.

Once more the throttle advanced a notch, the spark lever two--and the hand halted at sixty-five. The wind gripped them afresh, and like human fingers grappled with them. Up, fairly level with their eyes, lifted the advancing yellow-white ribbon. By his side, though he did not look, the man knew that the girl had covered her face with her hands, was struggling against the gale to breathe. He was struggling himself, through wide-opened nostrils, his lips locked tight. On his bare hands the sweat gushed forth and, despite the suction, glistened bright. Yet once more, the last time the throttle moved, the spark--and met on the s.e.xtant. With its last ounce of power the great car responded, thrilled; one could feel it, a vital thing. Once again the speed-hand on the indicator stirred; but this time the man did not see it, dared not look even for the fraction of a second. Like grim death, grim life, he clung to the wheel; his eyes not on the road beneath but a quarter of a mile ahead. About him the scuttling earth shaded from motley to gray; but he did not see. A solitary tree loomed ahead beside the ribbon, and seemed to crack like a rifle report as they flashed past. At the radiator vent a tiny cloud of steam arose, caught the gale, and stung damp on his cheeks. Far ahead, then nearer and nearer miraculously, a blot of green that he knew was the tree fringe of a river, took form, swept forward to meet them, came nearer and nearer, arose like a wall--

Back into neutral, separating until they were once more opposite, went the two companions of the s.e.xtant. Simultaneously again the speed indicator followed the backward trail. Incredibly swift the gale dwindled, until it barely fanned their cheeks. The roar of the great engine subsided, until once more it was a gentle murmur. The vivid green and the dull yellow of summer took their respective places; and like a live thing, beaten and cowed, the big car drew up at the very edge of the grove, left the yellow road-ribbon, rustled a moment amid the half-parched gra.s.s and halted in the shadow blot of a big water maple--thirty miles almost to a rod from the city limits they had left.

A moment the two humans in the seat remained in their places, breathing hard. Deliberately, almost methodically, Roberts wiped the sweat from his face.

"Thirty-two minutes, the clock says," he commented. "We dawdled though at first. At the finish--" He looked at the indicator peculiarly. "I'd really like to have known, for sure."

The girl stood up. She trembled a little.

"Would you really? Perhaps--"

"You looked, Elice? I fancied you shut your eyes."

"I did--only for a second. It read seventy-two."

Roberts turned a switch and the last faint purr ceased.

"I imagined, almost, you'd be afraid," he said evenly.

"I was--horribly," simply.

"You were; and still--I won't do it again, Elice."

Without a word the girl stepped to the ground. In equal silence the man followed. Taking off the long khaki coat he spread it on the ground amid the shadow and indicated his handiwork with a nod. For a half-minute perhaps he himself remained standing, however, his great shoulders squared, his big fingers twitching unconsciously. Recollecting, he dropped on the gra.s.s beside her.

"Pardon me, Elice," he apologized bluntly, "for frightening you." He smiled, the infrequent, tolerant, self-a.n.a.lytic smile. "I somehow couldn't help doing what I did. I knew it would break out sometime soon.

I couldn't help it."