“A superior machine driven by a superior chauffeur might,” was the reply. “Anyway, that’s a motor-car coming, and there’s no other way to get in here. We’ll see the lights in a moment.”
“Gee!” Jimmie exclaimed. “Do you think our friends chased the men who stole the _Bertha_ up in a high-power automobile?”
“That’s just what I do think!” exclaimed Carl.
“And that is undoubtedly the fact,” Sam agreed.
Doran and his companion seemed to share in the pleasant anticipations the boys were now sensing, for they approached them in a friendly manner and began asking questions regarding the oncoming machine.
The savages were still drawing farther away, and Sam occupied his time during the next moment in finding his way back to the tents and procuring another automatic revolver which had not been discovered by the outlaws. He held it so that the two boys caught sight of the brown barrel and nodded significantly toward Doran and his friend.
“He doesn’t mean to let them get away,” said Jimmie to Carl, in a low aside. “He seems to be next to his job!”
The savages, with their eyes fixed upon the jungle near the river bank, kept crowding farther away from the machines. The clamor of the motors came louder every instant, and directly two powerful acetylene lamps looked out of the tall grass like great blazing eyes.
The savages no longer hesitated as to how to meet this new situation. They dropped their spears and whatever else they had in their hands and broke for the thicket, uttering such cries of fright and terror as the boys had never imagined could issue forth from human lips. Doran and his companion sprang for the machines as the savages disappeared.
When Ben, Glenn and Mellen came bumping up in the automobile, a minute later, they saw the two fellows standing by the side of the _Louise_ with their hands held high in the air. Before them stood Sam with a threatening revolver pushed to within six inches of their faces.
“Jerusalem!” exclaimed Ben, springing from the machine. “This looks like a scene in one of the fierce old dramas they used to put on at the Bowery theater! Are those the men who stole the _Bertha_?” he added nodding toward the two whose arms were still held out.
“They came here in the _Bertha_!” replied Carl.