way."

They watched in great anxiety. Mr. Jervice closed the rear doors of his
van and put the heavy bars in their slots, but, secure in the isolation
of his surroundings, he did not apply the padlock. Wherein, Mr. Jervice
committed a grievous error.

Scarcely was he concealed within the orchard than the two scouts rushed
to the car, lifted the bar and swung back the door. There lay their new
comrade, helplessly trussed and gagged, faint and weary with the close
confinement, almost ready to collapse.

"Water!" he gasped, as Apple took the gag from his mouth. "Get me a
drink."

Apple was able to supply him from his canteen, and even as he held it to
the parched lips, Chick-chick was slashing the cords that had been drawn
needlessly tight.

"I think I can manage this little old machine, I can," announced
Chick-chick. "Apple, you can run my bike. Go back and get it."

"Rub my wrists where the cords cut, while he's gone," Glen begged. "That
fellow that tied me up--he's a thief, that's what he is. He pulled 'em
tighter just to see me wince."

He was too cramped to stand on his feet so Chick-chick kneeled down at
his side to rub some circulation into his wrists and ankles. Suddenly a
great noise of running was heard. Chick-chick looked out through the
crack of the door.

"It's the peddler," he declared. "He's running like a bull was chasing
him, he is. He's headed straight for the car."

"We'll give him a surprise," said Glen. "Probably he's run on to
somebody who knows that he's a thief and they're after him. I'll just
lie the way I was and you stand where the door will hide you."

Glen missed his guess in one important trifle. J. Jervice did not wait
to be surprised. He was in such terror that he waited for nothing. He
threw a pack in at the door, slammed it, dropped the bar in place with
the incredible swiftness of long practice and in less than a minute had
his motor cranked and the car in motion.

Coming up on the motorcycle a minute later Apple saw the car
disappearing around a turn in the road, and wildly chasing it a puffing,
panting old man, brandishing a heavy club.

The positions of the scouts were changed for the better, but they yet
were a long distance from freedom. Instead of Glen tied and gagged in
the car with Chick-chick and Apple following on the motorcycle, Apple
now was following alone, while, imprisoned in the car, were both Glen
and Chick-chick with the fortunate difference that the gag a