"Undoubtedly," Greg nodded. "But the mad dog might cross through the woods and be found waiting for us on that other road. Or, he may now be headed for the second lake, or even be there now."
"Let"s vote on what we"re going to do," urged Hazelton. "d.i.c.k, what do you say?"
"I don"t know what to say," their young leader answered. "I don"t like to see our party cheated out of our vacation. Neither do I care to take too many chances of having our vacation changed into a tragedy. I"ve never had hydrophobia, but I"ve a strong notion that it wouldn"t be pleasant. I know just how you fellows feel. You hate to lose your fun."
"We do hate to lose our fun," agreed Darry.
"And yet you don"t want to have an encounter with a dog that has hydrophobia."
"We don"t," approved Tom Reade. "d.i.c.k, you have a truly wonderful intellect when it comes to successful guessing."
"There"s a cloud of dust up the road to the west," discovered Greg Holmes.
In an instant all eyes were turned that way.
"Can that be the dog?" asked Darry. "Something is traveling this way and stirring up a lot of dust."
Whatever the moving object was, it appeared to be half a mile away up the straight, dust-covered road.
"Until we find out what it is," d.i.c.k suggested, "I believe that tree climbing will prove healthful exercise."
Quickly they moved the push cart a little to one side of the road.
Then they ran for trees, but every member of d.i.c.k & Co. retained his hold on his bludgeon.
The dust cloud was coming nearer. From the elevation of his perch in a tree d.i.c.k soon discovered and announced:
"It"s a horse and wagon coming this way."
"Maybe it"s the officers returning from the hunt," suggested Reade, who was on a lower limb of the next tree.
"There"s only one man in the wagon, and he"s whipping up the horse,"
d.i.c.k announced.
"There are good enough reasons for the man wanting his horse to hurry," chuckled Danny.
"Maybe the dog is in pursuit now," hinted Darrin.
d.i.c.k, who had the best view of the road to the westward, peered carefully.
"I don"t see anything to suggest a pursuing dog," Prescott made answer. "If the dog is near, he must be running under the trees along the side of the road."
Greg climbed up beside his leader.
"Why, that man has stopped whipping the horse," young Holmes declared.
"And is lighting his pipe. That doesn"t look as though he were very much scared about anything."
"We"ll stay where we are until we"ve talked with the man," d.i.c.k decided.
Just before reaching the other end of the covered bridge the driver, a farmer, and with what looked like a light load of farm produce in the body of the wagon, slowed his horse down to a walk, at which gait he drove over the bridge. Then, sighting the boys up in the trees, and each with a club, he reined up.
"h.e.l.lo, boys!" he called drawlingly. "Who"s been a-chasing you?
What scared you?"
"Read that notice, sir, tacked up at the bridge entrance," urged d.i.c.k.
Alighting, and drawing a pair of spectacles from a vest pocket, the farmer complied.
"Mad dog, eh?" he drawled. "Sho!"
"Did you see anything of the brute?" called Darry.
"No; I didn"t," answered the farmer. "Don"t believe there is any mad dog along the way, either. I"ve reined up and talked with neighbors during the last hour and a half along the way.
They didn"t mention nothin" "bout any peevish dogs. Now, it stands to reason that the officers would have stopped and warned folks along the road, don"t it? And the neighbors would have pa.s.sed the gossip with me, wouldn"t they?"
"Didn"t you see any officers coming from this way?" asked d.i.c.k.
"Nary one," rejoined the farmer. "Only fellers that pa.s.sed me, coming from this direction, was two young dudes---I sh"d say about your ages. They was in a high-toned speed wagon-----"
"Automobile?" asked Reade.
"Said so, didn"t I?" drawled the farmer. "Them dudes looked mighty tickled about something. They was laughin" a whole lot and looked mighty well pleased with themselves. Do you reckon they was any friends of your"n, trying to have fun with you?"
"I can"t recall any friends who would try to put up such a pleasant surprise for us," said d.i.c.k dryly, as he slipped down to the ground.
"What did the fellows in the automobile look like, sir?"
That farmer possessed well-developed powers of observation, as was proved by the minute descriptions he gave of the two young men.
d.i.c.k"s chums, who had now joined him at the roadside, looked puzzled.
Then light dawned in Tom"s eyes.
"Jupiter!" cried Reade. "If it weren"t that they"re not in this part of the country, I"d say that the pair were Dodge and Bayliss!"
"How do you know they"re not in this part of the country?" asked Prescott dryly. Then, of the farmer, he further inquired:
"What kind of a car were they driving, sir?"
"A red Smattach, last year"s model," answered the man.
"That"s just what the Dodge automobile runabout is, and Smattach cars are not common in this section," muttered Prescott. Then he went over to take a keener look at the written notice on the sheet of white paper.
"This looks like disguised handwriting; it"s backhanded," d.i.c.k mused aloud. "But I notice one thing peculiar. Who makes a funny little quirl at the beginning of a letter "m," such as you see in this writing?"
"Bert Dodge!" flashed Dave Darrin, an indignant light flashing in his eyes. "So we"re six simpletons, held up by his shady tricks, are we? If Bert Dodge is anywhere ahead of us on the road, then I hope we have the good luck to meet him under conditions where he can"t jam on the speed and get away from us!"
"Joke on you all, is it?" asked the farmer, grinning quizzically.
"It looks like it," admitted d.i.c.k sheepishly. "You"re sure that none of the folks west of here heard anything of a mad dog, are you?"
"Pretty sure," nodded the farmer.