"You may as well remain here," he said. "I may want you, and you should realize without giving further trouble that you cannot hide from the police. Come, Mr. Carshaw, we have work before us in East Orange. Miss Winifred should be all right by this time." Rachel Craik actually laughed. She wondered why she had lost faith in Voles for an instant. "I'll send a doctor," went on Steingall composedly. "Your friend there needs one, I guess." "I'd sooner have a six-shooter," roared Mick the Wolf. "Doctors are even more deadly sometimes." So the detective took his defeat cheerfully, and that is the worst thing a man can do--in his opponent's interests. He was rather silent as he trudged with Carshaw and the others back to the train, however. He was asking himself what new gibe Clancy would spring on him when the story of the night's fiasco came out. CHAPTER XXV FLANK ATTACKS Somewhat tired, having ridden that day to Poughkeepsie and back, Petch, nevertheless, put up a great race after the fleeing motor-car. His muscles were rejuvenated by Polly Barnard's exciting news and no less by admiration for the girl herself. Little thinking that Jim, the plumber, was performing deeds of derring-do in the hall of Gateway House, he congratulated himself on the lucky chance which enabled him to oblige the fair Polly. He dashed into the road to Hoboken, and found, to his joy, that the dust raised by the passage of the car gave an unfailing clue to its route. Now, a well-regulated motor-cycle can run rings round any other form of automobile, no matter how many horses may be pent in the cylinders, if on an ordinary road and subjected to the exigencies of traffic. Voles, break-neck driver though he was, dared not disregard the traffic regulations and risk a smash-up. He got the best out of the engine, but was compelled to go steadily through clusters of houses and around tree-shaded corners. To his great amazement, as he was tearing through the last habitations before crossing the New Jersey flats, he was hailed loudly from behind: "Hi, you--pull up!" He glanced over his shoulder. A motor-cyclist, white with dust, was riding after him with tremendous energy. "Hola!" cried Voles, snatching another look. "What's the matter?" Petch should have temporized, done one of a hundred things he thought of too late; but he was so breathless after the terrific sprint in which he overtook Voles that he blurted out: "I know you--you can't escape--there's the girl herself--I see her!" "Hell!" Voles urged on the car by foot and finger. After him pelted Petch, with set teeth and straining eyes. The magnificent car, superb in its energies, swept through the night like the fiery dragon of song and fable, but with a speed never attained by dragon yet, else there would be room on earth for nothing save dragons. And the motor-cycle leaped and bounded close behind, stuttering its resolve to conquer the monster in front.