OVERHAULING THE THIEF.

Matt, headed in the direction of the canal and Phoenix, set the pace. It was a fast one, and Chub was blowing before they had covered a hundred yards.

"If you want me to travel with you," puffed Chub, "you'll have to be a little less hasty. What's the good, anyhow? Those motor-cycles are going a dozen feet to our one."

Matt pulled down to a dog-trot in order to explain and to give Chub a chance to get back his wind.

"You're wrong, Chub," said he. "Even at this rate, we're traveling faster than the motor-cycles, or at least as fast."

"The thieves can't be in much of a hurry to get away."

"No one is riding the motor-cycles. There are only two motor-cycle tracks leading this way, and we made 'em ourselves when we rode to the Bluebell."

"Mebby the thieves went the other way?"

"No tracks on the other part of the road at all."

Chub dropped his eyes to the road and scanned it as he jogged along. The marks left by the pneumatic tires of the motor-cycles could be clearly seen; and on either side of them was a heavier mark.

"Put me wise to it, Matt. Has a wagon been along here since we got to the Bluebell?" gasped Chub.

"A broad-tired freight-wagon from some of the mines," added Matt. "There were four horses hitched to it and it was going to Phoenix."

"Oh, slush!" exclaimed Chub admiringly. "You've hit it off straight as a die, Matt. Why, thick-headed as I am, I can count the hoof-tracks of the horses and see which way they were headed, now that you've given me the tip. But what has the freight-wagon got to do with the machines?"

"The wagon stopped close to the house on the Bluebell," went on Matt. "I could tell that by the way the hoof-tracks were all cluttered up. And then, too, around the place where the wagon stopped there were boot-marks. It's a cinch the freighter took our machines."

"It can't be that freighter is graftin' on his own hook, Matt, an' yet I'm a Navajo if I can see how Hawley ever put it up to have him run off with the wheels. I don't believe the gambler is keepin' track of us as close as all that."

"The freighter has the two machines," averred Matt. "Why he took 'em needn't bother us very much just now; we know they're in his wagon, and that's the principal thing. It's up to us to get the motor-cycles back. A four-horse freight-wagon, even when it's empty, can't travel very fast. About all we've got to do is to outrun the gait of a walking horse. The faster we beat it, the quicker we reach the wagon."

"It looks good to me," said Chub. "Say, I would have been up in the air, wouldn't I, if you hadn't been along? But for this mix-up in the hills, you'd have been starting for Denver."

"I was going to start for Denver to-morrow," returned Matt, "but I'm not particular about a thing like that, Chub, when my friends need me."

"True to your friends always, eh?" said Chub, his blue eyes glistening. "No wonder Motor Matt makes a hit with everybody."

"And connects with a few hits himself, now and then," added Matt dryly. "How about another spurt, Chub? That wagon didn't have much the start of us, and when we get to the top of the next 'rise,' I think we ought to see it."

"Spurt away! My legs are too short for sprinting, but I'll work 'em the best I can."

Elbows close to his sides, head up and shoulders back, Matt dug out once more. Chub rambled along beside him and bounced up the slight ascent. From over the "rise," and before they reached the top of it, the boys could hear the creaking of a heavy wagon, and the hoarse voice of a driver swearing at his horses. A few moments more and they were looking breathlessly down on the freighting outfit, trekking slowly Phoenixward and not more than a hundred feet from where they were standing.

There was one red-shirted, rough-looking man on the driver's seat—just one. The freighter had a long black-snake whip, and was snapping it about the ears of the leaders. But what appealed to the boys most was what they saw in the rear of the wagon.

From their elevated position they were able to look down into the high box of the vehicle. Evidently the freighter was going "empty" into Phoenix after supplies for some mining-camp; but there was more in the box than there had been when it started from the mine, for the two motor-cycles were there, lashed with ropes to the sides of the high box.

"There he is!" panted Chub, "and thank our stars there's only one. But if he gets hostile—and if he happens to have a gun——"

"Peaceful freighters are not carrying guns," said Matt, "and if he gets hostile—well, there are two of us."

"Sure," cackled Chub, "and if we have a set-to, Matt, you can count on me to make a noise like a prize-fighter, anyhow."

The freighter's conscience did not appear to trouble him in the least, for he was not paying the slightest attention to the trail behind him. With one foot on the brake, he was whoa-hawing his four-horse team and talking like a pirate.

Matt and Chub ran swiftly down the slope. When they were close to the wagon, Matt swerved to pass around it and get to the heads of the horses, while Chub, getting suddenly reckless, jumped up on the end of the "reach" and slammed into the end gate.

The noise Chub made drew the freighter's attention. The man turned and gave a savage yell when he saw Chub.

"Git off'n thar, you!" he whooped, and with the words his long whip leaped backward in a sinuous coil.

Snap! went the lash, like the report of a pistol, and Chub tumbled into the road, holding both hands to the side of his throat.

Matt's temper began to mount at the brutal way Chub was treated. The incident, while unpleasant for Chub, afforded Matt time to pass the man and gain the heads of the leaders of the team.

"Stop!" he shouted, grabbing the bits of the horses and pushing them back on the "wheelers."

The freighter had already clamped the brake-shoes to the wheels, so that the wagon, although on a slope, did not run down on the wheel-horses. Taking his attention from Chub, the man turned in the seat and glared at Matt.

"Git away from them hosses!" he shouted, jumping to his feet, with the whip in his hand. "Git away, I tell ye, or I'll snap out one o' yer eyes with this here whip-lash. I kin do it—don't you never think I can't."

"You'd better cool down," cautioned Matt, his gray eyes glimmering, "if you don't want to get into more trouble than you can take care of."

"I ain't goin' ter take none o' yer back-talk, nuther," whooped the man. "Le'go them bits!"

He began lifting the handle of the whip, preparatory to using the lash.

"You've got two motor-cycles in the back of your wagon," said Matt, keeping wary watch of the freighter, "and they belong to my chum and me. What business have you got taking them off?"

"Belong to you, eh? Well, I reckon not. Young Perry told me they belonged ter him an' a pard o' his, an' he tucked a dollar bill inter my hand fer takin' 'em ter town."

Matt was astonished at this piece of information.

"Where did you see Perry?" he demanded.

"I don't know as I got ter palaver with you, but I don't mind sayin' that young Perry was on a hoss clost ter the house on the Bluebell as I come by. He stopped me an' told me ter take in the machines, jest as I was tellin' ye. Now, drop them bits, or thar's goin' ter be trouble."

"Say," called Matt earnestly, "you've been fooled. Perry don't own those machines, but was—-"

"Perry's a friend o' Hawley's, an' Hawley is a friend o' mine," roared the freighter, "an' I'm takin' his word agin' your'n. Git away from thar. Last call!"

Matt did not get away. A second more and the whip-lash leaped at him between the heads of the leaders. Quick as a flash he ducked to one side, and the lash snapped harmlessly in the air. Then, as the lash flickered for an instant on the neck-yoke, Matt executed another quick move. Reaching out, he caught the end of the writhing whip firmly, and gave it a jerk, in the hope of pulling it out of the freighter's hands.

What happened was more than Matt had expected.

The whip did not come away, but the freighter was toppled out of the wagon-box and took a header earthward alongside the off wheel-horse.

He gave a convulsive movement and then became quiet.

"You've killed him, Matt!" cried Chub frantically.

"Rot!" flung back Motor Matt, hurrying around to where the freighter was lying and hauling him away from the hoofs of the horses. "He's just stunned, that's all. Jump into the wagon, Chub, and untie the wheels. When you're ready, I'll help you get them into the road. Sharp's the word now, old chap. I'll watch the freighter while you're working with the machines."

Chub, chuckling to himself over the neat way fortune was coming to their aid, once more climbed into the wagon.

Matt, noticing a movement on the part of the freighter that told of returning consciousness, drew his big, ham-like hands behind him and twined the whip-lash about the wrists.

It was well Matt took this precaution, for, a moment after the tying was completed, the man's eyes opened.

"Tryin' ter kill me, was ye?" he snarled.

"Not at all," said Matt coolly. "I was trying to take the whip away from you, and you fell out of the wagon."

"All ready, Matt!" called Chub.

Matt whirled away from the freighter, to help Chub get the motor-cycles down. Hardly were the two machines on the ground, when the boys heard the freighter yell and saw him charge toward them. It had been impossible for Matt to tie his hands securely with the whip, and he had freed himself and was hustling toward the rear of the wagon, to intercept the boys and prevent them from getting away.

"Quick, Chub!" yelled Matt. "Get into the saddle and let your machine out for all it's worth. We've lost too much time as it is."

There followed a wild scramble, a half-dozen revolutions of the pedals, and then the motors began to work. The two machines glided up the slope, leaving the baffled and swearing freighter far behind.