“You don’t think I’m going to allow Fanning Harding to scare me out of anything, do you?” he demanded in as near to a rough tone of voice as he had ever used to his sister.

Poor Peggy felt the stinging tears rise.  But she said nothing.  The next moment the cars began to glide off, running side by side on the broad country road.  Faster and faster they went.  The speed got into Roy’s head.  He began to let the Blue Bird out, and then Fanning Harding, for the first time seemingly, realized what a formidable opponent he was placed in contact with.

As they reached the bit of road previously agreed upon as a race course, the banker’s son stopped his machine and hailed Roy to do the same.

“Tell you what we’ll do to make this interesting,” he said, “we’ll change machines.  Or are you afraid to drive mine?”

“I’ll drive it,” said Roy recklessly, in spite of Peggy’s quavered:  “Say no.”

“Good.  That will give us a fine opportunity to compare the two machines,” cried Fanning Harding.

He jumped from the bigger car and handed out his companion.  Then, for the fraction of a minute, he bent, monkey wrench in hand, above one of the forward wheels.

“A bolt had worked loose,” he explained.

“Come on Peggy,” urged Roy, and against her better judgment Peggy, as many another girl has done before her, obeyed the summons, although an intuition warned her that something was not just right.

“Ready?” cried Fanning from the Blue Bird.

“All ready”; hailed back Roy, who found the spark and throttle adjustments of the maroon car perfectly simple.

“Then—­go!” almost screamed Regina Mortlake.  Peggy was looking at her at the moment, and she was almost certain she saw a look of hatred flash across the girl’s countenance.  But before she could give the matter any more thought the maroon car shot forward.  Close alongside came the Blue Bird.

Motor hood to motor hood they thundered along at a terrific pace.  The road shot by on either side like a brown and green blur.

“Faster!” Peggy heard Fanning shout somewhere out of the dust cloud.

Whi-z-z-z-z-z-z!  It was wild, exciting—­dangerous!

“Roy,” gasped Peggy, “if——­”

But she got no further.  There was a sudden soul-shaking shock.  The front of the car seemed to plough into the ground.  A rending, splitting noise filled the air.

The car stopped short, and its boy and girl occupants were hurtled, like projectiles, into the storm center of disaster.

CHAPTER XVII.

JIMSY’S SUSPICIONS ARE ROUSED.

Peggy, after a moment in which the entire world seemed spinning about her crazily, sat up.  She had landed in a ditch, and partially against a clump of springy bushes, which had broken the force of her fall.  In fact, she presently realized, that by one of those miraculous happenings that no one can explain, she was unhurt.