The Miller press. [volume] (Miller, S.D.) 190?-current, 1909-10-07

less. the distance of long white road
between them and their quarry
seemed TO grow larger and larger.
Marriott would not admit 1t to him
self as yet, but a horrid fear lurked
in his mind that, after all, they were
going to be beaten. Both men were
suffering mentally, and physically al
SO. Michael Grants whole mind and
body were t~hrobbing with the terrible
excitement and shock of seeing the
little boy, whom they had rushed
across Europe to rescue, whisked out
OF his sight on the very steps of the
hotel in which he had been staying.
He saw the whole hope of his life
recede from him. He knew, or
thought he knew, that on this mo-
ment. in this crisis, everything de-
pended upon his success or failure.
He was. In fact, chasing the hope of
his life. and seeing his opportunity
OF achieving it gradually departing.
At such a moment as this, of nervous
strain, with brain and mind In a whirl
OF sensation and excitement, he could
not judge with his accustomed calm
ness. He felt as though everything de-
pended upon the issues of this one
great mad race. He forgot, or was
incapable of remembering, that, even
If the first car o~utdistanced them.
they, knew at any rate where the
Duke was and whittier he was going.
Physically, he was in extreme dis
comfort. Every motorist knows that
travelling at the huge speed at which
they were going needs all sorts of
precautions.
Grant had been wearing a soft grey
hat and a flannel suit when Marriott
dragged him into the car. His hat
had disappeared. The wind of that
great progress cut into his body like
a knife, and he found it impossible to
keep his eyes open for more than a
second at a time.
There had been no chance Of fitting
on motor-glasses in which to travel
at fifty miles or more an hour, and
without such a %precaution and upon
a dusty German country load a racing
speed is a torture which very few
people would willingly face.
He kept his right hand over his
eyes and sat ready. He drove well
himself, and, trained as he was 10
appreciate all forms of physical
achievements, he realized hat in the
intrepid sailor by his side a great
motor racer had been lost.
Basil, for his part, was wearing an
ordinary cap Of Harris tweed, which
he had damned down over his fore
head. He was bending forward over
the steering-wheel, regardless of any,
thing but the one dominating thought
of pursuit and capture. But he also
was suffering the extreme of discom-
fort.
1t was curious that, although not
physically so fine a man as Grant, his
naval training had hardened him to
the extent that he felt far less than
the other. His brain worked more
quickly than Grants i'm this event.
For the moment he was the leader,
both in mind and body, of this wild
madness.
The stolid country folk came out
OF their cottages and gazed in alarm
at the mad career of the two cars.
The telegraph poles went by with the
rapidity of eyes being suddenly opened
and shut. The Rhine, so broad at
Cologne, seemed to narrow to a point
as they fled onward. The great car
leaped from the ground for yards, and
ran on with a deafening din, as
the furious explosive mechanism be-
low them, tanned to their use, revolted
with the voice as OF a thousand fiends.
They had caught wild-fire and i'm.
prisoned it in steel; and the captive
element roared like tigers, and threw
them onward as a bullet from a gun.
Still the other car increased its dis.
lance. 1t was now at least a quarter
of a mile ahead, and the towers and
roofs of Bonn were becoming clearer
and more clearly defined in the bright
air.
Steam had been rising from the
front of the car for some little time.
Marriott realized that the cooling
water supply was giving out. The
car, of course, was not prepared for
such a race as this. 1t had only been
driven up for inspection.
Ito be contlnued)