id="page_19" class="x-ebookmaker-pageno" title="19"/>Then, together, they would visit the central garages. The outlying establishments they would call up by telephone, they decided. Surely, every automobile, stolen or otherwise, must have gasoline. Somewhere, then, it might be reasonably expected, trace of the Big Six would surely be discovered.

It seems likely, and probably is true, that the boys failed to appreciate the great number of cars constantly going and coming through all such large cities as Albany, Buffalo, Cleveland and the like. Living in a much smaller place, where tourists from a distance, especially those with licenses from other states, were quickly noticed, they did not understand that machines from far and near are so numerous upon the great motor thoroughfares that they attract scarcely passing notice.

Disappointment followed disappointment as Phil and Dave pursued their task. The fact that the police department had a perfect description of their car and the assurance of the lieutenant, with whom Phil talked, that every patrolman had the number of the stolen machine, were the only bits of encouragement they found.

“Didn’t ye have insurance against theft?” asked a pleasant young fellow at a new garage not far from the capitol. “Ought to have a fire and theft insurance policy,” he declared, “then you let someone else do the worrying.”

“Too late to think of it now, I’m afraid,” said Phil with a forlorn smile.

“That’s true enough,” said the other, “but I was just thinking how lucky a fellow considers himself when he does have insurance in a case of this kind. There was an illustration of it up state just this spring. Man had a new car. Used it just a little, over winter. In April it was stolen and it never was found. He got a check for pretty nearly all he paid for it because he had insurance. He didn’t have to lose any sleep, you see.”

“Also, you may be able to sell him another car, because he has the money to pay for one,” suggested Dave, his eyes twinkling.

“Now you’re trying to jolly me,” returned the young man good-humoredly. “But I didn’t mean it that way. Fact is, the man was away up at Harkville—’way out of our territory for Torpedoes.”

“Hello, now!” exclaimed Way, eagerly. “Was there a Torpedo stolen in Harkville, recently?”

“Not lately. Two months ago,” the other answered.

“Who lost it?” And again Way glanced sharply at Dave. The latter was listening to every word but taking care to betray no unusual interest.

“H—m—m—Hull, Kull—why, that’s it! Kull was his name. But your car was not a Torpedo, was it?”

If the young man thought that in this question he guessed the reason for Phil’s wish to know more of the incident mentioned, he guessed wrong, of course. But unwilling to tell just why he was interested, until he should have had time to think, Phil gave him no enlightenment.

“No,” answered Way, “the Torpedo people don’t build a six-cylinder car, do they?”

“That’s right, yours was a six,” said the other. “Makes you so much the greater loser, with no insurance.”

“What luck did the Harkville man have finding his car? Someone must have looked for it even if he did have insurance.”

“Guess they did look for it,” said the garage man forcibly. “First Kull and the police, then the insurance people and detectives, and believe me, insurance companies don’t care how much it costs to find a stolen car if they’ve had to pay for it. They do get stung though, and last I heard, Kull had his money, for his car was never found, high or low. Strange case! Never a clue to go by. A padlock pried off Kull’s little garage and the machine gone and—there you are.”

“Strange!” muttered Phil, but he was thinking too, that, though this was exceedingly interesting information, he must not allow it to take his thoughts from the loss that meant so much more to himself and friends, personally. So, thanking the young man, he and Dave left the garage.

“Why didn’t you tell him about the Torpedo? She’s the Harkville car as sure as you’re born!” spoke MacLester, immediately the two were beyond hearing.

“It might have done no harm, and again—there’s the trouble! I wanted to talk it over with you. It seems small and mean, but still we didn’t pay out railroad fare and all that to help find the owner of that Torpedo. We wired Kull and did our part. He may be in Griffin right now to claim the property.”

“More likely he doesn’t care. He got insurance money, so why bother any more about it? That would explain the whole thing—the whole reason why our telegram was never answered,” Dave reasoned.

“It looks that way,” Phil replied. “And our chasing the Torpedo is chasing right away from the car we want to find. Blame it all! We don’t seem to get anywhere. Here we go stumbling into things about the Torpedo but no clues at all to the Six!” All of which, and the disgruntled tone, were both unusual words and manner in young Mr. Way.

The day had long since closed. The boys found a comfortable hotel and went to bed, leaving a call for half-past five as the train for Pittsfield left Albany at six-thirty. The distance was not great and as several important automobile routes branched out from the Massachusetts town, it was considered a likely source of information.

Tired as they were, Phil and Dave must and did discuss at length the day’s developments before they fell asleep. A sense of duty that they should report at once the apparent fact that they had found the stolen Harkville car, weighed somewhat upon their minds.

“But what if we do? What happens?” they reasoned. “We are put out just that much in hunting for the Six. We lose time being called as witnesses, and a lot of botheration, just when we need every minute, and nothing much is gained. A few days will make no difference with regard to the Torpedo, long ago given up as beyond recovery.”

And so resolving to stick to the more important business first, but to report the finding of the stolen Harkville car just so soon as details of identification and the law’s red tape would not be so inconvenient, they put the subject aside.

Thanks to Chief Fobes, in part, and also thanks to their own error, in part, the boys were making a costly mistake by believing the trail of the Torpedo had no connection with the theft of their own car. Or so it would seem, would it not? And yet, even if the thieves who first stole the Harkville car were the same who, later on, made off with the Big Six, what could be gained by going back along the route to deliver the one recovered machine instead of pursuing diligently the more recently stolen property?

“We’ll never see our car again; that I know,” said Dave MacLester, glum and despondent. He pulled on his shoes in the stuffy little hotel room next morning, as if life were to him a barren, barren waste.

“It’s mostly the time of day, Mack,” said Way good-humoredly. “Half-past five has a mighty blue appearance after you’ve been eating strange grub, and staying up till midnight the day before. You’ll brighten up like the shining sun if we can only get out where there is such a thing—that and get hold of a little news to-day.”

“We haven’t got hold of any yet,” asserted MacLester, not a bit more cheerfully.

And his words were the truth, cold and harsh, as the truth may sometimes be, beyond a doubt.