Chapter XVI

THE BROKEN HOODOO.

The constable, in leaving the sugar camp for Purling to do his telephoning, had taken his own rig. Having finished his work in Purling, he made his return journey to the sugar camp in the automobile which Matt and McGlory had hired. A few words were enough to convince the driver of the car that it was useless for him to wait at the general store for the one-eyed sailor.

The automobile could not ascend the rough hill road, but waited at the foot of the slope while the constable climbed to the sugar camp and informed those there that a conveyance was ready to take them wherever they wanted to go.

Pryne having suddenly recovered and bolted, only Matt, McGlory, Goldstein, and the two Chinamen were in the hut. Without loss of time they accompanied the constable down the long wooded slope.

"What are the prospects for capturing Bunce and Grattan, officer?" inquired Matt, while they were slipping toward the foot of the hill.

"Mighty poor," answered the constable, "if you want me to give it to you straight. But I've done everythin' I could. There ain't any telegraft line to Purling, so I had to telephone my message to Cairo. They're pretty much all over the hills by now."

"Then what makes you think Bunce and Grattan will get away?"

"Why, they'll be goin' so tarnation fast on them pesky machines there won't be any constable in the hills with an eye quick enough to recognize 'em from the description. Anyhow, what do you care? The fat Chinaman's happy, an' the Jew's so glad he walks lop-sided. What is it to you whether them hoodlums git away or not?"

"Oh, hear him!" muttered McGlory. "It means three hundred cold, hard plunks to us, constable. The two pesky machines that took those tinhorns away have to be paid for by Motor Matt and Pard McGlory."

"Do tell!"

"If you hated to hear it as bad as I hate to tell it you wouldn't ask me to repeat."

"Noble sir," spoke up Tsan Ti, "you and your worshipful friend shall not be out a single tael. I, whom you have benefited, will pay for the go-devil machines. That, if you will allow me, comes in as part of your expenses."

"Now, by heck," said the constable, "that's what I call doin' the han'some thing. I've put in a leetle time myself, to-day," he added, "an' I cal-late I'm out nigh onto ten dollars. But I helped do some good, an' that's enough fer me."

"Here, exalted sir," observed the mandarin, and dropped a twenty-dollar gold piece into the constable's palm.

"I don't believe I got any change," said the officer.

"No change would be acceptable to me," answered Tsan Ti, with dignity.

"Waal, now, ain't I tickled? There's a dress in that fer S'manthy an' the kids. 'Bliged to ye."

"The old boy's beginning to get generous, Matt," whispered McGlory. "Maybe, after all, he really intends to fork over that thousand and expenses."

"Of course he does," said Matt.

When they reached the automobile, all six of them crowded into the car. Seven passengers—counting the driver—made tight squeezing in accommodations built for five, but Goldstein and the constable were dropped at Purling, and comfort followed those who remained, thereon.

Goldstein, following his burst of ecstasy over the recovery of the satchel, had relapsed into a subdued condition. Very likely he realized that he was under something of a cloud, inasmuch as he had come to Purling to treat with a thief for the loot of a magnificent haul. Goldstein remembered that Grattan had not been at all backward in giving Motor Matt the details of everything connected with the Eye of Buddha, and the reflections of the diamond broker could not have been at all comfortable or reassuring.

Matt allowed the Jew to go his way without a rebuke. He felt that the man had been punished enough; and, besides, he was the cause of their discovering the place where the ruby had been concealed. But for Goldstein, the Eye of Buddha might never have been located.

On the way to Catskill from Purling, Matt gave an account of what had taken place in the old sugar camp. Grattan had been at considerable pains to explain many things that had been dark to Matt and his friends, and the king of the motor boys passed along the explanation.

The history of the Egyptian balls was particularly interesting to Tsan Ti, no less than other details connected with the robbery; and the way Bunce had played tag up and down the mountainside with Matt and McGlory held a deep fascination for the cowboy.

"Taking this little fracas by and large," observed McGlory, when Matt had finished, "I think it's about the most novel piece of business I ever had anything to do with. It began with a lot of 'con' paper talk shoved at Pard Matt by Tsan Ti, and from the moment we met up with the mandarin there's been nothing to it but excitement, and a little uncertainty as to just where the lightning was going to strike next."

"You two illustrious young men," said Tsan Ti gravely, "have laid me under staggering obligations. Money may pay you for your loss of time, but nothing except my gratitude can requite you for the excellence of your service. You will hear from me through Sam Wing to-morrow."

The boys got out of the automobile at the hotel, and Matt had the car take Tsan Ti and Sam Wing up the mountain to the Kaaterskill.

"They're a pair of pretty good chinks, after all," said McGlory, "and I'm glad to think I had a little something to do with keeping the yellow cord from getting in its work on Tsan Ti."

On the following day, Tsan Ti sent Sam Wing to Catskill with a heavy canvas bag.

"Me blingee flom Tsan Ti," explained Sam Wing. "Him takee choo-choo tlain fol San Flisco, bymby ketchee boat fol China. Heap happy."

"He has a right to be happy," said McGlory.

"How much did he have to put up for that wrecked motor car, Sam?" asked Matt.

"Twenty-fi' hunnerd dol'."

"He went and stung him!" whooped McGlory. "The old robber."

"No makee hurt. Twenty-fi' hunnerd dol' all same Tsan Ti likee twenty-fi' cent to me. Him plenty lichee man."

When Sam Wing went away, Matt and McGlory dumped the contents of the canvas sack out on the table. The money was all in gold, and totaled two thousand dollars, even.

"He figured out expenses at a thousand dollars," remarked the cowboy. "They're 'way inside that figure."

"He's the sort of fellow, Joe," said Matt, "who'd rather pay a man ten dollars when he only owed him five, than five when he owed ten."

"Sure! He's the clear quill, but he sure had me guessing, the way he jumped around. I'll bet he connected with more good, hard jolts on this trip to America than he ever encountered in his life before."

"We came pretty near it, ourselves," laughed Matt. "I can't remember that I ever had a more violent time."

"It was some strenuous, and that's a fact. If you live a hundred years, pard, and drive automobiles all the while, you'll never scrape closer to kingdom come, and miss it, than you did when we came down the mountainside with the mandarin at the steering wheel."

"I wouldn't go through that experience again for ten times the amount of money there was in that bag."

"I wouldn't, either—not for the Eye of Buddha. There's no easy money in turning a trick for Tsan Ti. I reckon we earned all we got."

THE END.

THE NEXT NUMBER (31) WILL CONTAIN

Motor Matt's Mariner;

OR,

FILLING THE BILL FOR BUNCE.

"Buddha's Eye"—The Green Patch—Motor Matt, Trustee—Bunce has a Plan—Bunce Speaks a Good Word for Himself—The Home-made Speeder—Trapped—The Cut-out Under the Ledge—Between the Eyes—The Man from the "Iris"—Aboard the Steam Yacht—Grattan's Triumph—From the Open Port—Landed, and Strung—A Crafty Oriental—The Mandarin Wins.

MOTOR STORIES

THRILLING ADVENTUREMOTOR FICTION

NEW YORK, September 18, 1909.

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