“The state highway runs along here on this side somewhere,” remarked Burk. “We’ll have to keep away from it; it’s dangerous for us right now.”
He swerved to the right to avoid crossing the ribbon of asphalt that cut through the woods, and the two walked parallel to the files of telegraph wires lining the highway. For five minutes or so they followed a course which brought them ever nearer to Wallistown; and each of those passing minutes, they knew, brought the net of capture ever closer.
Suddenly Burk gave a sharp exclamation, and pointed. “Something funny ahead!” he said warningly.
It was too late to turn back. A few yards before them, the highway bent toward them in a sharp angle. They stopped in their tracks, and looked on a strange scene.
The queerest vehicle Jake had ever seen was tilted drunkenly at the side of the road at the outer corner of the bend. “Half flivver, half covered wagon,” the boy described it to himself. Two little seats huddled behind the steering-wheel; the remainder of the chassis was roofed over by a spreading arc of canvas, patched and weatherworn, stretched over hoops fastened in the truck-like body of the car, from the rear of which hung down a few narrow steps. The right-hand wheel at the rear was firmly bedded in the ditch; the opposite wheel in front was raised several inches from the road. Two quaint figures stood mournfully gazing at the ditched wheel. One of these was a short, very fat woman of middle age. She stood with her stout arms akimbo, and with such a downcast look on her dark face that Jake almost burst out laughing. Her arms glittered with several bracelets, and large rings dangled from her ears. The man at her side was also short and fat, and also wore earrings, and in one hand swung a spreading black hat which, when worn, must have given him the appearance of an Italian bandit in a stage melodrama. With his other hand he was scratching among his graying locks with a perplexed air.
He must have heard Burk and Jake approaching, for he wheeled about on his toes, and flashed a dazzling display of white teeth at them.
Jake had taken in the situation in an instant.
“We’ll help you get back on the road, Mister!” he said. “Come on, partner—let’s give them a hand!” He gripped the ditched wheel, and tried to lift it.