Again Way looked anxiously in all directions, trying vainly to learn whence his friends had so mysteriously fled. No sight or sound of them could he discover. "Got your car running again sooner'n you expected, didn't you?" grinned Freddy, coming close up. "When did you get in?" "Not sooner than _we_ expected--sooner than _you_ expected, wasn't it?" responded Phil. "Haven't been here long. You came in this morning." "How'd you know?" Perth demanded with a searching look. "Bird told me," Phil smiled. "Where you staying?" "Ask the bird that, too!" grinned Freddy. "Well, see you later. Be here for the races, I take it," Way laughed, not at all put out by Perth's adroit reply to his own question. With a little wave of the hand he walked quickly away; but a glance over his shoulder a minute later assured him that Perth, Gaines and Pickton were following not far behind. The latter two had loitered in the background while the conversation with Fred was taking place. If Phil was astonished to find himself so unexpectedly alone, it was apparent that the Trio were scarcely less so. Perth was certain he had seen Billy Worth at the same moment he had first seen Way. What had become of Billy and where were Dave and Paul? Phil, himself, would have given something at this particular moment to have been able to answer these questions. Meanwhile it was obvious his first task was to escape from the three who followed. Where was Gaines' Roadster? If he could lead the Trio far enough from their car that they would not have that means of pursuit, it might be that Billy and the rest would come along in the Thirty, pick him up and thus enable all to make their escape quite readily. Acting on this thought, Phil turned into the first residence street intersecting Main, the business thoroughfare. Even now he was but a few blocks distant from where the Thirty had been left. Surely, he reasoned, some one of his friends would be watching the direction he took. One of them would manage, some way, to get into communication with him, even if they did not come dashing up with the machine and effect his rescue. Was it an instance of telepathy--the action of Billy's mind, or Paul's or Dave's or of all three, upon Phil Way's--that caused the latter to think of a sudden, rapid dash in the car, after the Trio had been led a safe distance from their own machine, as a likely means of escaping them? Such a thing is not impossible. It is not, indeed, improbable. And yet, although stranger instances of thought transference have been fully proved, it may have been after all only a coincidence that the plan that came into Phil's mind was exactly the one Billy Worth suggested to Paul and David and which they prepared to put into execution.