don't look well. Besides, I--got another." He put his hand
insinuatingly to his hip pocket with a grin, but Billy's grin answered
back:

"That's all right, pard. I'll just keep this one awhile then. You don't
need two. Now, what's wanted?"

Pat edged away from the boy and measured him with his eye. The moon was
coming up and Billy loomed large in the darkness. There was a
determined set to his firm young shoulders, a lithe alertness about his
build, and a fine glint in his eye. Pat was really a coward. Besides,
Pat was getting nervous. The hidden telephone had called him several
times already. He could hear even now in imagination its faint click in
the moss. The last message had said that the car had passed the state
line and would soon be coming to the last point of communication. After
that it was the mountain highway straight to Pleasant View, nothing to
hinder. It was not a time to waste in discussion. Pat dropped to an
ingratiating whine.

"Come along then, Kid. Yes, bring your wheel. We'll want it. Down this
way, just over the tracks, so, see? We want you to fall off that there
wheel an' sprawl in the road like you had caught yer wheel on the track
an' it had skidded, see? Try her now, and just lay there like you was
off your feed."

Billy slung himself across his wheel, gave a cursory glance at the
landscape, took a running slide over the tracks with a swift pedal or
two and slumped in a heap, lying motionless as the dead. He couldn't
have done it more effectively if he had practised for a week. Pat
caught his breath and stooped over anxiously. He didn't want a death at