Barney McGee gave a long, melodious whistle.

"Lifted your motor, ma'am! That was a d--, excuse me, a devilish low scoundrelly trick. If I could get to a telephone, we would round him up before he gets to Wyoming."

"Oh, Mr. McGee, if you would only help us, we would owe you a debt of grat.i.tude all our lives."

"You say the motor was out of fix, ma'am?" he asked. "Then it may have broken down, again. I'll just climb up and take a look at the countryside. What color was the car?"

"Red."

To Nancy's consternation, Barney McGee stood up on his saddle and grasping a limb, drew himself up into the very tree in which Billie was now making herself as scarce as possible.

It was an absurd situation and the two young girls hardly knew whether to keep silent or to speak. Billie kept saying to herself:

"I'm sure I look just as I do when I wear my gymnasium suit, but, oh, dear, I wish he hadn't chosen this tree."

As the cowboy swung up the next limb, Billie leaned around and looked straight down into his face. She was about to say:

"You needn't come any further. I can see the country perfectly," when words failed her and she burst out laughing.

Barney McGee smiled gravely back.

"Excuse me, I am afraid I've intruded," he said, observing the silk bloomers with an expression of guarded amus.e.m.e.nt.

"I suppose he thought I was a Suffragette," Billie laughingly told her friends afterwards.

"Billie, my dear child, what are you doing?" cried Miss Campbell, who now for the first time saw the strange bird roosting in the tree above them, and the good lady groaned aloud as her eye took in her young relative's costume.

"Wilhelmina," she exclaimed in a shocked voice, "what will Mr. McGee think of you-in-in those things?"

"Don't scold her, ma'am," called down the cowboy, "it's an illigent climbing costume."

"I have some gla.s.ses, Mr. McGee," said Billie calmly. "I haven't been able to manage them yet and keep my balance. Perhaps you can do better than I can."

Barney McGee, as nimble as a mountain goat, as he pulled himself above Billie, his spurs jingling musically, now took the gla.s.ses and scanned the surrounding country.

While he looked, Billie scrambled down as fast as she could and in two seconds had slipped back on her skirt and buckled her patent leather belt.

The Motor Maids and Miss Helen felt not unlike a shipwrecked party with a sailor aloft in the lookout searching for a sail in that vast ocean of prairie.

"Hip, hip, hurray!" cried Barney McGee, so suddenly, that he gave Miss Helen a start of surprise. "I've found it, ma'am. I've found the red motor and it's coming this way. Sure as me name is Barney, it is. It's driven by one person and it's goin' fast."

"Coming this way?" they cried in unison.

"It's about three miles to the southwest and at the rate it's goin' it ought to be here in no time."

"Is it on this road?" cried Billie.

"It is, Miss, and it'll pa.s.s by here unless it shoots out over the prairie, which it won't."

"It is very strange," said Miss Campbell. "I should think the thief would take another direction."

"Perhaps he's doubling on his tracks," suggested Mary.

Barney had a long pistol in his belt and this he now took from its case, and examined critically while the girls looked on fearfully.

"You're not going to shoot him, I hope?" asked Billie.

"It may not be necessary, Miss."

"No, no. Don't do that under any circ.u.mstances," put in Miss Campbell.

Barney gave a humorous, good-natured grin.

"I'll defend the ladies," he said.

The suspense of waiting was almost more than they could endure. Miss Campbell proposed that they pile all the suitcases one on top of the other and take their stand behind them, like an improvised fort.

Billie suggested that they lay them across the road so that the car would be obliged to stop. As for Barney, he leapt on his Texas horse and took his stand like a sentinel in the middle of the road, pistol c.o.c.ked.

But the Comet appeared before the girls could do anything. They saw it a long way off like a red speck on the road and as it came nearer, their wonder grew in proportion. On the chauffeur's seat sat Peter Van Vechten.

CHAPTER VIII.-CUTTING THE BONDS.

Peter Van Vechten was driving the car but he made no attempt to stop it.

In fact, he seemed not to recognize their faces as he came toward them, and it was evident that Barney McGee unless he wanted to be run over would have to make haste to get out of the road, for the motor car was taking a very uncertain and rickety course on the highway.

Another half minute and they found themselves standing helplessly in the road, the automobile fifty yards away.

Barney, flourishing his pistol and digging his spurs into his horse was after it like a flash.

"Don't shoot! Don't shoot!" they screamed. "We know him."

But it was too late. There was the report of a pistol and the sound of the motor ceased almost instantly.

Rushing down the road, Billie in the lead, they found the car at a standstill, Peter Van Vechten lying out on the ground with Barney leaning over him.

"You've killed him," cried Miss Campbell.

"No, no, ma'am. It was the tire I punctured, and not the thief. He fainted of his own accord."

"But there is something the matter. He is injured," exclaimed Mary.

"Look at the bruise on his forehead."

"Poor boy! Poor Peter," said Miss Campbell, and immediately they all set to work to restore the aviator.