The woman was in a great summer hotel where extravagances of all sorts
are in vogue, and it had been her latest game to call with her lute-like
voice over the phone to three of her men friends who had wooed her
the strongest, daring them all to come to her at once, promising to fly
with the one who reached her first, but if none reached her before
morning dawned she remained as she was and laughed at them all.
Laurence Shafton had closed with the challenge at once and given orders
for his car to be ready to start in ten minutes. From a southern city
about an equal distance from the lady, one Percy Emerson, of the
Wellington-Emersons, started about the same time, leaving a trail of
telegrams and phone messages to be sent after his departure. The third
man, Mortimer McMarter, a hot-headed, hot-blooded scot, had started with
the rest, for the lady knew her lovers well, and not one would refuse;
but he was lying dead at a wayside inn with his car a heap of litter
outside from having collided with a truck that was minding its own
business and giving plenty of room to any sane man. This one was not
sane. But of this happening not even the lady knew as yet, for Mortimer
McMarter was not one to leave tales behind him when he went out of
life, and the servants who had sent his messages were far away.
The clock in the car showed nearly twelve and the way was long ahead.
But he would make it before the dawn. He must. He stepped on the
accelerator and shot round a curve. A dizzy precipice yawned at his
side. He took another pull at the flask he carried and shot on wildly
through the night. Then suddenly he ground on his brakes, the machine
twisted and snarled like an angry beast and came to a stand almost into
the arms of a barricade across the road. The young man hurled out an
oath, and leaned forward to look, his eyes almost too blood-shot and
blurred to read: "DETOUR to Sabbath Valley!"
He laughed aloud. "Sabbath Valley!" He swore and laughed again, then
looked down the way the rude arrow pointed, "Well, I like that! Sabbath
Valley. That'll be a good joke to tell, but I'll make it yet or land in
hell--!" He started his car and twisted it round to the rougher road,
feeling the grind of the broken glass that strewed the way. Billy had
done his work thoroughly, and anticipated well what would happen. But
those tires were costly affairs. They did not yield to the first cut
that came, and the expensive car built for racing on roads as smooth as
glass bumped and jogged down into the ruts and started toward Sabbath
Valley, with the driver pulling again at his almost empty flask, and
swaying giddily in his seat. Half a mile farther down the mountain, the
car gave a gasp, like the flitting soul of a dying lion, and came with
sudden grinding breaks to a dead stop in the heart of a deep wood.