The Rover Boys Megapack

by Edward Stratemeyer

  Even while the lads were eating they had to give further details of the disastrous flight. Doctor Wallington congratulated them on their escape.

  “You had better leave flying alone after this,” he remarked.

  “I think we shall—for a while, at least,” answered Tom, dryly.

  As soon as it was possible to do so, the boys sent a message to the girls and to their folks, telling about the accident and of their escape.

  “It’s bound to get in the newspapers,” said Dick. “And if we don’t send word the others will be scared to death.”

  The oldest Rover boy was right about the affair getting in the newspapers. The local sheets gave the accident a column or more and some city sheets took it up and made a “spread” of it, with pictures that were truly thrilling even though they were inaccurate.

  “Humph! look at this picture!” cried Sam, showing up the supplement to a New York Sunday newspaper. “Looks as if we hit the smokestack of the locomotive and sailed along on that for a mile or two! Phew! what an imagination that artist must have!”

  “And here is a picture showing the train climbing over the biplane!” returned Tom. “Say, it’s a wonder we didn’t wreck the Express instead of the Express wrecking us!”

  On the day following the accident the boys were told, after class hours, that some gentlemen wished to see them. They went to the reception room, to find two men there—a lawyer and a doctor.

  “You are the—er—the young gentlemen who were in the—er—the flying machine smash-up?” queried one of the visitors, sharply.

  “Yes,” answered Dick.

  “Mr. Rover?”

  “Yes, Richard Rover.”

  “Just so. Glad to know you. My name is Fogg—Belright Fogg. This is Doctor Slamper. We represent the railroad company, Mr. Rover. The doctor came along to see if you had been hurt.”

  “I got this,” answered Dick, with a quiet smile, and pointed to the lump on his forehead.

  “Ah, yes, I see,” put in Doctor Slamper. “Not very serious, I take it.”

  “Oh, it didn’t kill me.”

  “Ha! ha! Good joke, Mr. Rover! Feel pretty good otherwise, eh?”

  “Oh, I’m able to sit up.”

  “And these other young gentlemen are all right, of course,” went on the doctor, smoothly.

  His manner was such that the boys were disgusted. Evidently he had come to smooth matters over, so that they would not put in a claim for personal injuries. And the lawyer had come to ward off a claim for the loss of the Dartaway.

  “No, I’m not all right, Doctor—far from it,” cried Tom, before the others could say another word. And then the fun-loving Rover went on: “My knee is sprained, and my back twisted, and I have a pain in one of my right teeth, and my brothers both got their arms wrenched, and one got his left big toe out of joint, and none of us can see extra good, and I think my big brother’s right ear is out of order, and my digestion is not what it should be, and I fear—”

  “Stop! stop!” interrupted the doctor, in amazement. “Do you mean to say—”

  “And the back of my neck feels out of kilter somehow,” continued Tom, “and Sam’s left hip isn’t just as straight as it should be, and when I hit my elbow I have the funniest sensation crawl down my shoulder blade ever was, and we all think we ought to go to a sanitarium for at least six months or a year; don’t you think so, too, Doctor?”

  “Well, I never!” gasped Doctor Slamper, falling back against a center table. “Why, my dear young men, I think—”

  “And the Dartaway is gone—our dear old flying machine!” groaned Tom. “The machine we hoped to fly in to Washington, to the next inauguration. Why, don’t you know that the planes of that machine were covered with the autographs of most of the big men of this country? Whenever we sailed around to visit our friends or the big men we had them write their autographs on the canvas wings of the machine. Those autographs alone were worth about a million, more or less!”

  “What’s this?” put in Belright Fogg, quickly. “A flying machine valuable because of the autographs on it? Preposterous! If you think the railroad will stand to pay anything on such a thing as that, you are mistaken.”

  “But how are we to get those autographs back?” whined Tom. “Some of the men who gave them may be dead now!”

  “See here, let us get down to business,” cried Belright Fogg. “You don’t look to be knocked out—at least, not a great deal anyway. Am I right, Doctor?”

  “I—I think so. Of course they may be—be shocked a little,” returned the physician. “Probably they are—from the way this young man talks—little nervous disorder.” And he pointed at Tom, while Dick and Sam had to turn away, to keep from bursting into laughter.

  “Um! Nervous, eh? Well, a few days of quietness will remedy that,” answered the lawyer. “Now, see here.” He looked wisely at the three Rovers. “Our railroad disclaims all responsibility for this accident. But at the same time we—er—we want to do the right thing, you know—rather do that than have any unpleasant feelings, understand? Now if you are willing to accept our offer, we’ll fix this matter right up and say no more about it.”

  “What is you offer?” questioned Dick.

  “Three hundred dollars—one hundred dollars each.”

  “You mean for our personal injuries?” questioned Sam.

  “I mean for everything.”

  “Nothing doing,” returned Dick, promptly, and with a bit of pardonable slang.

  “You will not accept?”

  “We might accept three hundred dollars for the shaking up we got—although we don’t know if our nerves are all right or not. Sometimes these things turn out worse than at first anticipated. But the railroad has got to pay for the biplane it smashed.”

  “Never!”

  “I think it will.”

  “You got in the way of the train—it was your own fault.”

  “Your track isn’t fenced in—I have a right to cross it where I please. If I had a wagon and it broke down, you would have no right to run into it. The law might not hold you criminally liable, but it would hold you liable for the worth of the wagon and contents.

  “Say, are you a lawyer?” queried Belright Fogg, curiously.

  “No, but I know my rights,” returned Dick, promptly.

  CHAPTER VI

  THE MISSING BIPLANE

  For a moment there was silence. The lawyer and the doctor who represented the railroad company looked from one to another of the Rover boys.

  “Pretty shrewd, aren’t you?” said the lawyer, finally.

  “We have to be—in dealing with a railroad company,” answered Dick, bluntly. “Now let us get to business—if that is what you came for,” he continued. “We might put in a big claim for damages, and I think a jury would sustain our claim. But we want to do what is fair. The question then is, Do you want to do what is fair?”

  “Why, yes, of course,” returned Belright Fogg, but he did not say it very cordially.

  “Very well then. That flying machine cost us twenty-eight hundred dollars new and we have spent over two hundred dollars on improvements, so when she was smashed she was worth at least three thousand dollars.”

  “But you can save something, can’t you?” gut in the lawyer.

  “Perhaps we can save the engine, and a dealer in second-hand machinery may give a hundred dollars for it. Now what I propose is this: You pay for half the value of the biplane and we’ll call it square.”

  “Preposterous!”

  “Very well then, Mr. Fogg, we’ll consider the interview closed.”

  “If you sue, you won’t get a cent, Mr. Rover.”

  “That remains to be seen.”

  “I am willing to give you five hundred dollars in place of the three hundred first offered.”

  “No, sir—it is fifteen h
undred or nothing, Mr. Fogg.”

  “But you have not been hurt.”

  “Yes, we have been hurt. I have been to our college doctor about this lump on my head, and my brothers have been to him, too. We were badly shaken up—not as much as my brother made out, but enough. If we have to sue we’ll put in our claim for personal injuries as well—and maybe for time lost from our studies.”

  “But fifteen hundred dollars! I—er—I can’t see it,” and the lawyer began to pace the floor.

  “Maybe we had better sue,” suggested Sam. “We might get the full amount of our loss—three thousand for the Dartaway and some for our injuries.”

  This did not suit the lawyer at all, for he had been instructed to settle if possible and thus avoid litigation, for the railroad authorities had heard that the Rovers were rich and might make the affair cost a good deal.

  “I will—er—make my offer an even thousand dollars,” he said, after some more talk. “But that is my limit. If you won’t take that, you’ll get nothing.”

  “All right—we’ll sue,” said Dick, and he made a move as if to close the interview.

  “See here, are you of age—have you authority to close this matter?” demanded Belright Fogg, suddenly.

  “I can close the matter, yes,” answered Dick. “My father will be perfectly satisfied with whatever I do. I transact much of his business for him.”

  “Ah, well then, let us consider this thing a little more, Mr. Rover.” And thereupon the lawyer went all over the matter again. Presently he offered twelve hundred dollars. But Dick was firm; and in the end the lawyer said he would pay them fifteen hundred dollars the next day, provided they would sign off all claims on the railroad.

  “We’ll do it as soon as we see the money,” answered Dick.

  “Can’t you trust me, Mr. Rover?” demanded Belright Fogg.

  “I like to do business in a business-like way,” answered Dick, coolly. “When you bring that check kindly have it certified,” he added.

  “Very well!” snapped the lawyer; and then he and the doctor got out, Belright Fogg stating he would return the next morning.

  “Dick, you ought to be a lawyer yourself!” cried Tom. “You managed that in fine style.”

  “Tom helped,” added Sam. “He nearly scared that doctor into a fit, talking about our aches and pains!”

  “Wait—perhaps the lawyer won’t come back with the money,” said Dick. “He may reconsider the offer.”

  “You didn’t say anything about the wreckage,” said Sam. “Who gets that?”

  “We do, Sam. They are to pay us for damages, don’t you see? If they pay only that, they can’t claim the wreckage.”

  Promptly at the appointed time the next day Belright Fogg appeared. He was a bit nervous, for the railroad officials had told him to settle at once—before the Rovers took it into their heads to bring suit.

  “I have the check, certified,” he said, producing the paper. “Here is what you must sign, in the presence of witnesses,” he added, and brought out a legal-looking document.

  “We’ll call in two of the teachers,” answered Dick.

  The oldest Rover boy read the document over with care. It was all right, excepting that in it the railroad claimed the wreckage of the Dartaway absolutely.

  “Here, this comes out,” cried Dick. “The wreckage belongs to us.”

  At this there was another long discussion. But the Rovers remained firm, and in the end the clause concerning the wreckage was altered to show that the Dartaway must remain the boys’ property. Then the three brothers signed the paper and it was duly witnessed by two teachers, and the certified check was handed to Dick.

  “Very sharp young man, you are,” was Belright Fogg’s comment, as he was about to leave. “You ought to be a lawyer.”

  “Perhaps I will be some day,” was Dick’s answer.

  “Better get that check right in the bank!” cried Sam, when he and his brothers were alone. “That fellow may stop payment on it.”

  “He can’t stop a certified check, Sam. I’ll put it in the school safe for the present. What we want to do is to look after the Dartaway. She may not be worth much, but what there is of her belongs to us.”

  “Right you are. Let us get permission to go after her right away. For all we know, somebody may have carted her off already!”

  The boys readily obtained permission to see to their property, and walked down to the college stables to get a horse and carriage to take them to the spot where the accident had occurred. Just then came a toot of an automobile horn, and a fine five-passenger car rolled into view, with Stanley Browne and a stranger on the front seats.

  “Hello, you fellows!” cried Stanley, as the auto came to a stop. “Come over here! I hoped I’d see you!”

  The Rovers hurried across the campus and were introduced to Jack Mason, Stanley’s cousin, the driver of the car. He was passing through Ashton on the way to join his folks in the White Mountains.

  “Jack wants me to take a ride with him this afternoon,” said Stanley. “And I can invite three others to go along. Will you come with us?”

  “That is kind,” answered Dick. “But we have some business to attend to,” and he related what it was.

  “Say, let’s take a look at the wrecked biplane!” cried Jack Mason. “I’d just as soon go there as anywhere.”

  “So would I,” added Stanley.

  “Very well—that will suit us down to the ground!” cried Tom.

  “We were going to drive over in a carriage,” explained Dick. “We can get there much quicker in the auto.”

  The boys piled into the tonneau of the car and they started off.

  “Got to show me the roads,” said Jack Mason. “All I know around here is the regular auto road to the White Mountains,—and I don’t know that any too well.”

  “You can’t lose us on the roads!” cried Tom. “We’ll keep you straight.”

  Jack Mason loved to run fast and soon they were bowling along at a forty-mile-an-hour rate. Stanley and Tom told the driver what turns to make, and almost before they knew it they had passed the outskirts of Ashton and were approaching the locality where the fast Express had dashed into the crippled biplane.

  “Here we are!” cried Tom, presently. “We can’t go any further on the road. We’ll have to walk through the woods to the tracks.”

  “I see a wood road!” exclaimed Jack Mason. “If the ground isn’t too soft I’ll try that.”

  He went on and passed in between the trees, and soon they were within a hundred feet of the railroad tracks. As the car came to a stop the Rover boys jumped to the ground and ran forward. Then, of a sudden, all three set up a shout:

  “The biplane is gone!”

  “Gone?” queried Stanley, who was close behind them.

  “Yes, gone,” returned Tom.

  “Are you sure this is the spot where it was struck?”

  “Of course I am.”

  “There are the marks where we landed and where the locomotive hit the Dartaway,” said Sam. He looked around. “Wonder who took her, and to where?”

  “That’s to be found out,” answered Dick, seriously.

  “I don’t see any airship,” said Jack Mason, as he came up, having shut off the engine of the touring car.

  “Somebody has hauled it away,” answered Dick. He looked on both sides of the track. “This is queer,” he added, presently. “I can’t see any marks in the sand or mud or bushes. She’d make marks if anybody hauled her.”

  “I’ve got it!” cried Tom. “They hoisted her on a flat car! The railroad people have taken her!”

  “But she is our biplane!” cried Sam, stubbornly.

  “Maybe they took her to the freight house in Ashton,” suggested Stanley.

  “We’ll soon find out—if you’ll take us there in the auto.”<
br />
  “Sure!” answered Jack Mason, promptly.

  The boys were about to leave the neighborhood when they heard the strokes of an axe, ringing through the woods.

  “There’s a wood chopper!” cried Dick. “Maybe he knows something about this. I guess I’ll ask him.”

  They soon located the man—an elderly individual who worked for the farmer who owned the woods.

  “Yes, I see ’em hoist the airship on the flat car,” said he, in answer to their questions. “Had quite a job o’ it, too.”

  “Did they take it to Ashton?” queried Dick.

  “No. They was goin’ to fust, but then Jimmy Budley—the section boss—said it would be better to take it up to the freight yards at Rallston.”

  “And they took it there?”

  “I ’spect they did. They went off that way, anyway,” replied the old wood chopper.

  “To the Rallston freight yards!” cried Sam. “What a nerve!”

  “I’ll make ’em bring it back!” cried Dick, firmly.

  “How far is it to Rallston?” asked Jack Mason.

  “About nine miles.”

  “Pooh! that’s nothing. Jump in and I’ll take you there in no time—if the road’s any good.”

  “The road is O. K.,” answered Dick.

  The automobile was backed out of the woods, and turned in the direction of Rallston. Jack Mason was in his element, and in less than twenty minutes they came in sight of the town and turned into a side street leading to the freight yards.

  “There she is!” cried Sam, a minute later.

  He pointed to one of the tracks in the yards and there, on a flat car, the boys beheld the wreck of the biplane. A small crowd of curious men and boys surrounded the remains of the Dartaway.

  “What yer going to do with her, Jimmy?” asked a man in the crowd, of a burly individual on the flat car.

  “I guess the railroad is going to sell her,” replied the section boss.

  CHAPTER VII

  THE SALE OF THE BIPLANE

  “Did you hear what that man said?” demanded Sam in a whisper, of his brothers.

  “I did,” returned Dick. “But he isn’t going to sell our property,” added Tom, warmly.