gasped back. The wind whistled past
her, she lost her hat. She crouched in her seat, her hands clinging
tightly to the box, her head turned as though expecting their pursuer to
overtake them any moment.

Suddenly Tom frowned. At the same time the engine gave a grating
"b-r-r-r."

"Oh, what is it?"

"Oil's getting low----Bad----" she caught in answer. "Pulling
some----I'll----fool him, though--" He slowed down.

"Don't--" implored Robin.

"We'll turn down this road. _He'll_ go straight on. Clever, eh? Say, I
wouldn't have guessed you had all this spunk in you!" he took the time
to say, casting her an admiring glance.

He made the turn and the "baby" ploughed through the soft rough road at
a perilous clip. The road wound through thickly wooded hills, up and
down, apparently leading to nowhere.

Suddenly it twisted up a long hill. Tom's car climbed easily, slackening
its speed for a few moments at the top. Turning, Robin could make out
the course over which they had come and, to her horror, the little car
plunging over it.

"Look--_look!_" she cried.

"Well, I'll be--blowed!" Tom Granger stared as though he could not
believe his eyes. "He saw the marks of my new tires, I guess. He's a
sharp one. Cheer up--we're not caught yet." He increased the speed; they
tore down the slope in breakneck haste.

But, in the hollow, the car slopped out of the muddy ruts, gave a
sickening lurch sidewise and dropped with a jolt into mud to the axles.

His face white with excitement Tom Granger tore at the gears, tried to
go back, to go forward, but in vain. And, presently, they both heard the
distant throb of a motor.

Robin jumped down from the car, hugging her box. "I'll run. Good-bye,
Tom, thank you _so_ much!" She was far too excited to realize the
familiar way in which she had addressed him. She had cleared the ditch
and stood on the fringe of the deep woods.

"I'll tell you sometime--about it!" she flung to him.
"I'm--not--stealing! That man--will know--" and she disappeared among
the leafing undergrowth.

"Well, I'll--be--Oh, I _say_, Miss Forsyth, don't--" But the boy's
attention, quite naturally, turned to meet the enemy, who at that moment
appeared over the crest of the hill.

CHAPTER XXII

THE GREEN BEADS

Beryl waved Robin off to the Granger's with a forced cheerfulness. Left
alone, she sat in the room she shared with Robin and stared unhappily at
the disarray left from the frenzied packing and unp