"Ye ain't payin' me ter be no detectif," drawled the man. "Come! Sh.e.l.l I hitch on?"

"Oh, yes! I don't know what else to do," groaned the boy. "I've got to get the car fixed first of all. Then I will find help and follow the girls."

The farmer was as unsympathetic as a man possibly could be. He started the car and let Tom ride in it. But he had no word of advice to give about the absent girls.

Perhaps, like his wife, he believed that Tom was not honest, that the car was stolen, and that Tom's companions were mythical!

They rolled into Severn Corners at ten o'clock. Of course, in a hamlet of that kind, there was scarcely a light burning. Tom had learned from Blodgett that the local blacksmith sometimes "monkeyed with ortermobiles that come erlong busted."

So he had the farmer draw the car to the door of the blacksmith shop.

"Sim lives right next door, there," said Blodgett, preparing to depart.

"Mebbe ye kin wake him up an' convince him he'd oughter mend yer contraption in the middle of the night. But Sim Peck is constable, too, so mebbe ye won't keer ter trouble him," and the farmer drove away with a chuckle.

This news was, however, important to Tom. A constable was just about the man he most wanted to see. It had dawned on the boy's mind that his sister and Ruth had gotten into trouble, and he must find help for them.

The street of the village was dark. This was one of the nights when the moon was booked to shine, but forgot to! The town fathers evidently lit the street lights only when the almanac said there was to be no moon.

Tom removed one of the headlights and found his way to the door of the cottage next to the smithy. There was neither bell nor knocker, but he thundered at the panel with right good will, until he heard a stir in a chamber above. Finally a blind opened a little way and a sleepy voice inquired what he wanted.

"Are you the blacksmith, sir?" asked Tom.

"Huh? Wal! I should say I was. But I ain't no doctor," snarled the man above, "and I ain't in the habit of answering night calls. Don't ye see I ain't got no night bell? Go away! you're actin' foolish. I don't shoe hosses this time o' night."

"It's not a horse," explained Tom, near laughter despite his serious feelings. "It's a motor-car."

"Naw, I don't shoe no ortermobile, neither!" declared the man, and prepared to close the blind.

"Say, Mister!" shouted Tom. "Do come down. I need you----"

"If I come down thar, I won't come as no blacksmith, nor no mechanic.

I'll come as the constable and run ye in--ye plaguey whipper-snapper!"

"All right," cried Tom, fearing he would shut the blind. "Come down as constable. I reckon I need you in that character more than any other."

"I believe ye do!" exclaimed the man, angrily. "If you air there when I git on my pants, you'll take a walk to the callaboose. None o' you young city sports air goin' to disturb the neighborhood like this--not if I know it!"

Meanwhile, Tom could hear him stirring around, tumbling over the chairs in the dark, and growling at his boots, and otherwise showing his anger.

But the boy was desperate, and he stood still until the man appeared--tin star pinned to his vest.

"Wal, by gravey!" exclaimed the blacksmith-constable. "Ain't you a reckless youngster ter face up the majesty of the law in this here way?"

Tom saw that, after all, the constable was grinning, and was not such an ill-natured fellow, now that he was really awake. The boy plunged into his story and told it with brevity, but in detail.

"Why, I see how it is, youngster," said the man. "You're some scart about your sister and that other girl. But mebbe nothing's happened 'em at all."

"But where have they gone?"

"I couldn't tell you. We'll make search. But we've got to have something to travel in, and if it don't take too long to fix your auto, we'll travel in _that_."

Of course, this was good sense, and Tom saw it, impatient as he was. The constable laid aside the vest with the badge of office upon it, and the blacksmith proceeded to open his forge and light a fire and a lantern.

Then he listened to Tom's explanation of what had happened to the car, and went to work.

Fortunately the damage was not serious, and the blacksmith was not a bad mechanic. Therefore, in an hour and a half he closed the smithy again, removing his ap.r.o.n, and the constable donned his vest and got into the car beside the troubled Tom.

"Now let her out, son!" advised the official. "You've got all the law with ye that there is in this section, and ye kin go as fast as ye please."

Tom needed no urging. He shot the repaired car over the road at a pace that would have made his sister and her chum scream indeed!

Once at the bottom of the hill where the car had been stalled, they stopped and got out, each taking a lantern by the constable's advice.

Blodgett and his horses had done their best to trample out the girls'

footsteps, but there had been no other vehicle along the road, and the searchers managed to find footprints of the girls at one side.

"Sure them's them?" asked Mr. Peck.

"You can see they are not the prints of men's shoes," said Tom, confidently.

"Right ye air! And here's another woman's shoe--only larger. They went away with some woman, that's sure."

"A woman?" muttered Tom, greatly amazed. "Whoever could she be--and where have they gone with her?"

CHAPTER XII

A BREAK FOR LIBERTY

Ruth finally slept in the Gypsy van as sweetly as though she were in her own little bed in the gable room at the Red Mill. She was bodily wearied, and she had lost herself while yet she was watching the Gypsy Queen worshipping the pearl necklace, and fearing that the man with the evil eyes was peering into the interior of the van.

A hundred noises of the Gypsy camp awakened her when the sun was scarcely showing his face. Dogs barked and scampered about; horses neighed and stamped; roosters crowed and hens cackled. The children were crying, or laughing, and the women chattering as they went about the getting of breakfast at the fires.

The fires crackled; the men sat upon the van tongues cleaning harness after the rain and mud of the afternoon before. The boys were polishing the coats of the beautiful horses, till they shone again.

All these activities Ruth Fielding could see through the tiny windows of the queen's van, in which she and Helen Cameron were imprisoned. Her chum roused, too, but was half tempted to cry, when she remembered their circ.u.mstances. Queen Zelaya had gone out.

"Come on!" exclaimed Ruth. "We've got to make the best of it. Get on your dress and shoes, and perhaps they will let us out, too."

"Let's run away, Ruthie," whispered Helen.

"The very first chance we get--sure we will!" agreed her chum.

They found the door unlocked, and, as n.o.body stayed them, the two girls descended the steps to the ground. A cross-looking dog came and smelled of them, but the bold-looking girl who had brought the supper the night before drove him away.

Ruth essayed to speak to her, but she shook her head and laughed.

Perhaps she did not understand much English.