red the Gut. Evidently the driver
remembered the perilous place from when he had driven through on
approaching the house.

The car passed below going at a snail's pace while Frank was still a
short distance in the rear and Mr. Temple and Tom Barnum were not yet
in sight. It was an open touring car with the top folded back. There
were three men in it, one on the seat beside the driver and the third
in the rear. He was the man who had entered the Hampton house. The
driver appeared to be a New York taxi chauffeur, and probably had been
employed for the trip. The others were swarthy men, foreign in
appearance.

The man beside the driver, looking up, saw Bob, and shouted. At that
moment the car passed directly beneath him, and Bob leaped. He landed
on the running board beside the rear seat. Steadying himself as the
car lurched from the impact of his weight, Bob reached in and grasped
the man on the rear seat by the coat collar and half pulled him from
the car, so that his body lay across the door.

Then the unexpected occurred. The driver opened his throttle and the
car leaped ahead, and at the same time the man beside him stood up and
struck at Bob.

Bob leaned back to avoid the blow, and the next moment found himself
flat on his back in the road, with the car disappearing around the
curve.

Frank, who by now had reached the top of the bank, dropped to the road
beside him and bent over him with real anxiety in his voice as he
said:

"Bob, Bob, are you hurt?"

Ruefully rubbing the back of his head, Bob sat up.

"No," said he, "But they got away, Frank."

Again there was a crashing in the underbrush on the top of the bank,
and Mr. Temple and Tom Barnum came into view, red and perspiring.

"Escaped you, hey?" said Mr. Temple, leaping to the road, as Bob
scrambled to his feet. "But, say, I see you captured something all
right." And he pointed to a coat clutched fast in Bob's hand.

Then for the first time Bob noticed that in falling from the car he
had dragged his victim's coat with him. He held it up and looked at it
curiously.

"He must have been wriggling out of his coat when he found you
wouldn't let go," surmised Frank. "I could see him threshing around
just as I came up to the top of the bank. Then you fell and held on
tight and the coat was pulled from him."

"Yes, I guess that's the way it happened," assented Bob. "Well, I'd
rather have had the fellow. This isn't any good to me." And he tossed
the coa