CHAPTER III

SAVING THE AUTO

Fenn's brain was in a whirl. The manner of the girl, her strange words, her sudden fright when he had sought to recall to her what she had said, and her reference to a mysterious cave, all served to give the lad much to think about. Coming as it did, on top of the automobile accident, it added to the excitement of the day. He was glad, when he got down stairs, to find that his three chums had returned with the things for which the physicians had sent them.

"Well, were you playing nurse?" asked Frank.

"Say," declared Fenn earnestly, "I certainly was up against it. I had a delirious patient, who was talking about caves and strange men."

"Tell us," suggested Bart, and Fenn related what the girl had said.

"That's nothing," declared Ned. "She was talking in her sleep."

"No, it was delirium."

"Well, that's the same thing," retorted Ned. "It doesn't mean anything.

She was all worked up over the accident. Probably she looked ahead, saw the fence, and got scared half to death. Then, when the auto went over the cliff, and she and her father were spilled out, it might have looked as if she was falling into a cave. That's all."

"I don't believe it," declared Fenn determinedly. "I think there is something back of her talk. She was only partly delirious. Besides, she knew she had been talking about a cave, for she asked me to forget all about it. There's something in all this, and don't you forget it. Some day I'll find out what it is."

"You're a regular mystery solver, you are, Stumpy," declared Ned.

"Fenn! Fenn!" exclaimed an excited woman, coming into the dining room where the boys had gathered to talk. "What has happened? What is the matter? Are you hurt? Was there an accident? Why is Constable Darby in front of the house, keeping the crowd back?"

"There was an accident, mother," said Fenn, "and a man and a girl who were hurt have been brought here. I told them to fetch them in. I thought you wouldn't care."

"No, of course not. Poor things! I'm so sorry! Are they badly hurt?"

"I'm afraid the man is, but the girl seems to be getting better, except that she fainted awhile ago," replied Fenn, and he briefly related what had happened.

Just then Dr. Fanwood came into the room, to ask Fenn to heat some water, and he remarked:

"It is not so bad as we feared. The young lady is suffering from nothing but shock and some bruises. The man, her father, has a bad wound on the head, but nothing serious. They will both be all right in a few days. It was a narrow escape."

"Who are they, Doctor?" asked Mrs. Masterson.

"I have not been able to question either of them," replied the physician, "but, from papers which we found in the man's pocket I take him to be Robert Hayward, of Bayville, Wisconsin. The young woman is evidently his daughter, Ruth, though what they can be doing so far away from home, in an automobile, I do not know."

"Is he dangerously hurt?" asked Mrs. Masterson.

"Well, it would be dangerous to move him for a few days, as complications might set in. If he could stay here--"

"Of course he can," interrupted Fenn's mother. "He and his daughter, too. We have plenty of room."

"I am glad to hear you say so," replied the doctor. "They will get well more quickly if they are kept quiet. Now I must go back to my patient."

He took the hot water Fenn gave him and left the room. The four chums and Mrs. Masterson discussed the recent happenings, and the crowd outside, learning from the constable that there was no one dead, or likely to die, went off to look at the auto which still hung over the cliff.

Mrs. Masterson rather ridiculed Fenn's idea that the girl's talk had a bearing on some mysterious happenings, and she was of the same opinion as Ned, that it was merely the raving of delirium. But Fenn stoutly clung to his own idea.

"You'll see," he declared.

The doctors left presently, and Alice Keene, Bart's sister, who was something of a trained nurse, was installed to look after Mr. Hayward.

Miss Hayward declared she was not ill enough to be in bed, and wanted to look after her father, but Mrs. Masterson insisted that the young woman must consider herself a patient for several days, and declared that she would take care of her.

"Come on, boys," suggested Fenn, when the excitement had somewhat calmed down. "Let's see if we can't save the auto."

"I'm afraid if we disturb it the least bit it will go over the cliff,"

said Ned. "It's hanging on by its teeth, so to speak."

"We'll try, anyhow," decided Bart. "I'd like to help haul it back. Maybe we'd get a ride in it, after Mr. Hayward gets well."

"That's all you care about it," taunted Frank with a laugh.

"No, but if we do save it, I guess you wouldn't refuse a ride in it,"

retorted Bart. "It isn't often you get the chance."

"That's so," agreed Fenn. "But come on. If we wait much longer the crowd will get around it and, maybe, loosen the wire that holds it."

The four chums hurried to the scene of the accident. They found that the weight of the big car had stretched the wires so that the machine hung farther than ever over the edge of the cliff.

"It's going to be a hard job to save that machine," declared Ned. "How are we going to do it?"

"Let me think a minute," spoke Bart, who was usually fertile in devising ways and means of doing things.

"What ye goin' to do?" demanded Constable Darby who, having found his post as guard at the house an empty honor, had a.s.sumed charge of the machine. "What you boys up to now? You'd better move away from here."

"We're going to rescue Mr. Hayward's auto for him," declared Fenn with more a.s.surance than he felt. "He wants it hauled back," he added, which was true enough.

"Wa'al, ef he wants it, that's a different thing," replied the constable, who evidently recognized that Fenn had some rights in the matter, since the injured persons had been carried to the lad's house.

"I guess we've got ropes enough," spoke Bart. "The next thing is to get some pulleys and find something strong enough to stand the strain. I guess that big oak tree will do. Who knows where we can get some pulleys?"

"There are some at our house," said Fenn. "The painters left them there when they finished the job last week. I can get them."

"Good!" cried Bart. "You get 'em, and we'll get the ropes in shape."

When Fenn returned with the pulleys he found that his chums had taken several turns of one of the ropes about a tree, that was to stand the strain of hauling the auto back on firm ground. The pulleys were arranged so as to give more power to the hauling force, and then, the cables having been cautiously fastened to the back of the auto, Bart gave the word, and half a score of boys a.s.sisted the chums in heaving on the rope.

There was a long pull, a strong pull, and a pull altogether, but the auto never budged.

"Once more!" cried Bart.

"Hold on!" a voice urged, and the boys, and others in the crowd saw a telephone lineman approaching.

"That wire holds the wheels!" he explained, pointing to where the wire from the fence was entangled in the spokes. "You fellows hold on the rope and I'll cut it for you!"