gustedly, the temporary glow of success fading
before the torture of aching feet, "I don't see that they helped very much
when they were here. We did the suggesting, and all they did was to laugh
at our suggestions--"

"Well, there's no use in saying things about them now they're gone," said
Amy, but Mollie caught her up indignantly.

"Goodness, Amy," she cried, "it may not be your fault that you have a
gloomy disposition, but you don't need to sound exactly like a funeral!"

At this moment they were startled by the sound of a machine coming behind
them at furious speed. Some chickens, crossing the road and pecking lazily
as they went, scurried with alarmed squawking into the woods on either
side.

The girls, turning, started, gasped, then stared at each other.

"The motorcyclist!" cried Mollie, as they turned and ran after the fast
disappearing machine.

CHAPTER XXI

THE CHASE

"I--I--don't know what we're running after him for!" gasped Mollie. "We
haven't got a chance--in the world--of catching--him."

"Look," panted Betty, pointing to a machine at the side of the road with a
man in chauffeur's uniform sitting behind the wheel, "maybe we can get
him! Quick--"

Betty's action always followed hard upon the heels of impulse, and before
any of the girls had time to realize what she was going to do she had
darted across the road, had said a few excited words, and was tumbling
into the tonneau.

Without stopping to question, the girls followed, jumping in beside her,
and the chauffeur, after one surprised look, touched his cap and the
machine leapt forward like a wild thing.

Mollie had time, even in her excitement, to wonder how Betty had managed
it.

"I think she hypnotizes them," she muttered to herself.

And all Betty had really said to the man was, "Please follow that
motorcyclist! We mustn't lose sight of him!" and the man, obeying that
impulse for adventure that is in all of us, had complied.

The motorcyclist had sped around the corner and darted into one of the
side streets. A few minutes later the chauffeur turned the same corner
with a recklessness that made them gasp, turned it just in time to see
their quarry disappearing round another corner.

"Gosh, that fellow can coax some speed out of that machine of his!" cried
the man at the wheel. "But if you young ladies don't mind a little danger,
we may catch him yet."

"Oh, please don't think about us," cried Betty, her hands clutching