Page:Weird Tales Volume 5 Number 1 (1925-01).djvu/108

bones that it was the racy-looking car I had passed so exultingly, away back where the good road began. Well, all the better! If its driver had any sporting blood in him, I would show him a race that would test his gameness to the limit.

Like a thing unchained, the Gordon-Rennet responded to my touch. I smiled as I felt the rush of air and gave the car more gas. And then I ceased smiling and sank a bit lower in the seat. I was not losing the other. His open exhaust still thundered at my back. I was not gaining an inch.

Not really disturbed, yet a bit irritated at the ability of the unknown to keep pace with me, I pressed upon the gas pedal for a maximum feed to the carburetor, and narrowly watched the climb of the speedometer to eighty, eighty-five, ninety.

But despite the terrific speed with which I flew along the highway, there was no let-up to the thunderous roar of my pursuer's open muffler. I became really nervous then and swore aloud at the unbelievable possibility that the other's car might even pass my new Gordon-Rennet.

I was just turning to look behind in an angry effort to calculate the unknown racer's chances, when I heard a cry ahead. Like a flash I saw the situation. Two pedestrians had emerged from a wooded path directly upon the highway. They had no time to think. No time to move. No time to escape. They stood paralyzed with fright. And yet I seemed to have plenty of time to consider them and to consider the highway beside them. I realized instantly that it would be impossible for me to pass them on my right. I must swerve to the left, and yet I saw distinctly that this would be a tremendous risk, not alone because that side of the road was in a state of eruption, due to the work of a gas company's ditch digger, but because of the imminent danger of a collision with the racer coming from behind. I had not seen him, nor had I now time to raise a warning arm; but I knew he was there, for the clamor of his cut-out was at my very heels—I had not gained an inch.

And then I swerved!

There was a cry, a crash—and instinctively my right foot pressed the footbrake, while my left threw out the clutch.

I found myself upon the highway, and with footsteps light as air hastened back to where a racing car was overturned. Even yet one of the front wheels continued spinning, and curiously enough my first thought was a mental comment of approval upon the perfection of that wheel's noiseless bearings.

My foot struck a license tag upon the roadway and I gave an exclamation as I recognized it as my own. With that peculiar human attribute that causes us to touch a freshly painted post, I involuntarily turned to where I thought my own car stood, to see if my license plate was missing. Oddly enough, I did not see the car, and I kicked the license plate aside and approached the group made up of the two pedestrians and a silent form on the ground.

One of the pedestrians was kneeling beside the victim of the wreck, and I could not help giving vent to an exclamation as I saw him place his handkerchief over the face of the silent figure before him.

The other pedestrian was intent on the examination of a card-case, evidently taken from one of the pockets of the motorist.

"Is he dead?" I asked.

The man standing was too preoccupied to hear me, evidently, for he failed to answer me or to observe my presence; and even when I tapped him on the back he did not turn.