Part 4 (1/2)

When Connie Mallon suddenly gave a tremendous spring forward, and started on a full run, there was no holding the other three back. They went plunging madly on in his wake, paying little attention to the direction they took, so long as their flight promised to carry them away from those dreadful manifestations.

Elmer did not stop his labors; in fact he even went to some pains to increase the racket, under the impression that once you get a thing started it is good policy to keep it moving.

He had distinctly warned the others, however, not to allow their excitement to overlap their discretion; for should one of them so far forget himself enough to give vent to a genuine boyish shout, perhaps the panic-stricken quartette might become wise to the fact that they were being made victims to a great hoax.

”Come on, let's chase after them a bit, fellows!” Elmer told them, between his puffs through the birch bark megaphone; ”but keep well back, so that they can't get a look-in at us if they turn their heads. Noise is what we want, and plenty of the right kind.”

Acting on his suggestion the others trailed after their leader. They swished in and out of the bushes, and accompanied their progress with all manner of novel sounds, each of which was calculated to add just a mite more to the alarm of the fugitives.

More than once they heard loud cries of pain coming from ahead, as one of the runners collided with some tree which had not been noticed in his terror; or else found himself tripped up by a wild grape-vine that lay in wait for unwary feet. As Toby declared later on, all this was ”just pie” for the chasers; they feasted off it, and seemed to enjoy the run immensely; which was more than the Mallon boy, with his three cronies, could ever say.

At least Connie seemed to have kept his head about him in one important particular, which pleased Elmer very much; he knew in which direction lay their wagon, for which he had been in the act of sending one of his companions at the very moment this awful clamor broke out which had started them in full flight.

The neigh of a horse close at hand told Elmer what was happening, and he immediately held his eager clan in. Far be it from them to wish to delay the departure of the Mallon tribe, whose room was worth far more to the scouts than their company.

”Wait, and listen!” said Elmer, in a whisper.

”You didn't get the whole of that straight, Elmer,” Toby told him, quickly, in a low, husky voice; ”you ought to have said, 'Stop! Look!

Listen!' That's the way it always is at railroad crossings!”

”Hist! Be still!” cautioned the leader.

They could hear loud excited voices near by, accompanied by the stamping of horses' hoofs, as though the excitement had communicated to the team used by Connie Mallon and his three cronies in their rival nutting expedition.

”Now, let's start up again, and add the finis.h.i.+ng touches!” Elmer told the others, when a dozen more seconds had dragged past, and they felt they might safely a.s.sume that the fugitives must have untied the team, as well as scrambled into the wagon.

Once again did that strange chorus break forth, with Elmer groaning through his birch bark horn, and the others doing all in their power to accompany him in regular orthodox ghostly style, in as far as their limited education along these lines went.

Taken altogether the racket was certainly enough to scare almost any one. Snorts and prancing on the part of the horses announced that they were now sharing the general excitement. Then came cries urging haste, and presently the plain unmistakable smack of a whip being brought down with decided emphasis on the backs of the animals, several times repeated.

With that there was the crunch of wheels, and away dashed the two-horse wagon, making for the road which Connie knew must not be far away. Once or twice the scouts had fugitive glimpses of the departing vehicle as it flashed past small glades where the view happened to be un.o.bstructed; and it was certainly ”killing,” as George called it, to see those fellows bouncing about in the bed of the wagon, holding on for dear life, and with Connie plying the whip savagely, while the horses leaped and tugged and strained to make fast time over the uneven floor of the woods.

The echoes of the flight grew fainter in the distance, and presently as they stood there the scouts could tell from the change in sounds that those who were fleeing from the wrath of the ghosts must have reached the harder road, for the hoof beats of the horses came with a pounding stroke.

Gradually even this was dying away. Then the five boys turned and looked at each other, with their faces wreathed in huge grins.

”Tell me, Elmer, is it safe to let off steam now?” demanded Toby, eagerly.

”If you're careful not to be too noisy, go it!” came the reply.

With that Toby threw himself flat on his back, and began to kick his heels up in the air, all the while laughing, and giving queer gurglings that were meant to serve his pent-up emotions about as the escape valve of a boiler does when the steam presses too heavily on the boiler, and relief is necessary.

He was not alone in his hilarity, although the merriment of the others partook of a different nature. Ted, Chatz and George went around shaking hands, and a.s.suring each other that never in all their lives had they ever run across a more ridiculous diversion than this flight of the bold nut-gatherers.

”Talk to me about Napoleon's retreat from Moscow,” said George, who prided himself on his knowledge of history, ”why, it wasn't in the same category as that wonderful escape of the Connie Mallon gang from the raid of the Cartaret ghosts. And say, what thrilling stories they'll have to tell about it all! Believe me, the whole Hickory Ridge will know about it by night time. Oh! I'll never forget it! I haven't had so much fun for a whole year as to-day. It was worth coming twenty miles just to see them on the jump.”

”Why,” observed Ted, after he could regain his breath in part, ”that Phil Jackthon took the cake when it came to covering ground. Did you thee him clear that log like a buck? I bet you he made a record jump that time, and beat anything he ever marked up on the thlate at a match.”

”Well, they're gone, all right,” said Chatz; ”and from the way they whipped their poor hosses I'd like to guess they'll keep on the wild run till they get home. And there isn't much chance that we'll be bothered again by that Mallon bunch to-day; how about that, Elmer?”