They pa.s.sed well out of Bangor and were going along a country road, just as the sun was setting, when a chugging automobile was heard back of them. Soon a ramshackle old flivver drew up near them, driven by a young farmer lad.
He sized up the boys, then stopped his machine and asked:
"Going far?"
"On to Colter," answered Garry.
"Gosh, that"s a pretty good spell to walk," answered the farmer boy.
"I"m going on about four miles more; would you like a lift for that distance?"
"You bet we would," broke in d.i.c.k.
This brought a laugh from the others, and they accepted the lift, for it meant saving almost an hour on their way.
They piled into the old flivver, and soon were rolling speedily along the road. Despite its aged and decrepit appearance the car made excellent time, and the boys commented on this.
"Yep, she"s a pretty good old boat," answered the boy. "I don"t have much time to tinker with the looks of the thing on the outside, but I manage to keep the engine in pretty good condition. You can"t keep a farm car looking up to time every minute. Well, I turn in here in a minute, so I guess this is as far as you can ride, unless another car comes along. Will you come in and have a bite to eat?"
The chums thanked him cordially but refused his invitation, saying that they would cook their own meal an hour or so later.
Garry looked up at the sun and then remarked to his chums:
"It will be dark in two hours, and we can make just about six miles in that time without exerting ourselves too much. We haven"t done much of anything all day so if we want to let out a bit we can tack on an extra mile in that time and so save ourselves a bit of extra walking tomorrow.
Let"s go."
Hitching up their packs, the trio of chums set off at a brisk pace. The setting of the sun made it much cooler and the walking was pleasant.
They pa.s.sed through a small village and were well on the outskirts where the houses were beginning to get scattered, and they were deciding how far to proceed before picking a spot to camp for the night when they heard a call for help and the sounds of a scuffle. In the gathering gloom they could not see where the trouble was, but hastening towards the spot from where the voices seemed to come, they approached a bend in the road, and turning, saw two men attacking a third.
The attackers seemed to be rough specimens of humanity, while the third was a young man, fairly well dressed. This gave the affair the aspect of a robbery instead of a quarrel among a lot of ruffians, so calling his chums to hurry, Garry threw his rifle to his shoulder and shouted to the attacking party to throw up their hands.
The surprised thugs took one look at the business-like rifle in Garry"s hands, and then deciding that they might perchance overpower him seemed to be on the verge of rushing toward him when Phil and d.i.c.k turned the bend in the road. Seeing that they were outnumbered, and with no thought of the fact that the boys might fire on them, they turned on their heels and ran. Garry was about to send a shot flying after them when the young man who had been the subject of the attack called to Garry to let them go.
Just then he toppled over and fell at full length at Garry"s feet.
CHAPTER III
A NEW ALLY
Garry hastily unstrapped his canteen and unloosing the stopper, poured some of the water on the man"s face. At the same time, d.i.c.k, showing a surprising amount of speed for one so undeniably stout, sprang to help Garry and unloosed the man"s shirt collar.
In a few moments the man had been revived, and when he had come to, Garry asked him if he had been shot or stabbed or wounded in any way.
"No," replied the man weakly. "One of those jacks. .h.i.t me on the head with a club, and I guess I just got groggy. I wonder if you boys could help me home, I live a few hundred yards down the road."
"Indeed we will, you wait just a moment and we will improvise something to carry you on," replied Phil.
"No, you won"t have to do that, just give me an arm to lean on; that will do very nicely."
The boys did as he wished, and in a few minutes of easy walking they came to a neat little cottage, set back a few yards from the door with a number of flower beds scattered over the little lawn.
"Oh Grace," called the man, and soon a pretty young woman came to the door. When she saw her husband, for so he proved to be, leaning on the arm of Garry she flew down the path and asked anxiously what was the matter.
"Nothing at all. Just wait till we get in the house and I will tell you all about it," said the stranger. Then turning to the boys, he asked them to come in.
Anxious to hear what the cause of attack was, and why the man had wanted the rascals to escape, the trio accepted his invitation, and soon were sitting in the attractive little living room of the cottage.
"Now I suppose you boys who so kindly helped me out of a nasty hole would like to know what the whole business is about, wouldn"t you?"
asked the owner of the cottage.
"We are rather curious," answered Garry speaking for the others.
"My name is Howells, Arthur first name, generally called Art by my friends, and I am a timber scaler by occupation. I am scaling on the Boone cutting a few miles from here, and the chaps who attacked me were, until a few days ago, lumber jacks employed on the cutting. One morning I found them "spiking a tree," and forthwith sent a report to the office with a demand that they be fired. For that reason they met me tonight and attempted to get satisfaction by giving me a sound beating. Perhaps it would have been worse had you boys not come along so opportunely. I don"t think they would have murdered me, but could have easily put me out of commission so that I could not work, and that is one thing that I must do now of all times."
"But why did you want us to let them escape. I should think you would have wanted them put safely under lock and key for such an unwarranted attack," demanded Garry.
"Yes, Arthur," chimed in his wife. "I would have had them arrested and given a good long sentence. They might have killed you or crippled you."
"There"s just one reason. One of them was Dave Pingree, son of old Daddy Pingree who lives in the village near here. You know the son is a worthless scoundrel, but old Daddy has had so much trouble that I didn"t want to bring any more on him by having his son arrested, bad as he is, and as richly as he deserves to be jailed. The other one was a stranger to these parts, half breed Canadian by the name of LeBlanc, who picked up Pingree somewhere in the woods, and who has been his constant companion for the past few weeks, at least since the cutting operations of the Boone tract were started," concluded Howells.
The three boys were so startled at the sound of the name LeBlanc that they jumped to their feet simultaneously and asked Howells to repeat the name.
"LeBlanc is the name. But why does that surprise you so?" queried Mr.
Howells in surprise.
"What is his first name," demanded Garry without answering the question.
"On the payroll he is listed as Baptiste."
"We did not get a very good look at him in the dusk," said Garry. "Would you mind describing him for us, please. This is a peculiar situation, and we will tell you about it after you have described the man,"
answered Garry rather agitatedly.
"Why he is a swarthy chap about twenty-seven or eight, just about the same age as Pingree. He has black hair and mustache, and a jagged scar on one side of his neck, probably a knife wound from some lumber camp fight," answered Howells.
Garry sank back with a sigh of relief.
"At any rate he is not the man we think he is. The scar and the age settle that, although the rest of the description fits him well enough to make him a brother to Jean LeBlanc, the one man we do want to run across in this neck of the woods," replied Garry.
"Well, not that I want to raise any apprehension on your part, or tell you something that is displeasing to you, he is a brother of a man called Jean LeBlanc. I happen to know that this is so, for one night the lumberjacks were wrestling in front of the bunkhouse and boasting about their exploits, when this Baptiste came up and succeeded in throwing several of the men with a rather vicious hold. After he had thrown several of them he started boasting about his brother Jean, who had taught him the hold. I was standing at one side watching the wrestling, which is how I happened to overhear the matter. But why does the name of LeBlanc bother you so?" he asked in conclusion.
"That"s a rather long story," answered Garry "and perhaps I had better start by telling you our names. These are my chums, Phil Durant and d.i.c.k Wallace, while my name is Garfield Boone, generally called Garry for short."
"I don"t suppose you are any relation to the Mr. Boone who owns this tract where the summer logging is going on are you? Most people of that name in this state are somewhat related. In fact I am a second or third cousin of his myself," said Howells with a smile.
"Yes, I happen to be his son," answered Garry.