Page:The purple pennant (IA purplepennant00barb).pdf/136

Rh post like a hero, ready, however, to cut and run at the first alarm. It seemed the better part of an hour to him before the two blocks were traversed and Morris came back to announce that Common Street was reached. Over went the wheel and the Flying Juggernaut, grazing the curbing with a nerve-destroying rasp of steel against stone, turned toward the side entrance of the field. On the left now were several houses. Lights shone from windows. The boys held their breath as the last leg of the journey began. Suppose that, hearing the noise and viewing the unusual sight of a steam roller parading through the street at half-past ten o'clock, some busy-body should telephone to the police station! Morris didn't like to think of it, and so, naturally, he mentioned it to Gordon. Gordon assured him that the contingency had already occurred to him and that if he saw a front door open he meant to disappear from the scene with unprecedented celerity, or words to that effect!

But the suspense ended at last, for there, on the right, a break in the shadowed darkness of the high fence, was the open gate. Lanny swung the roller far to the left and turned toward the entrance. Then, however, a problem confronted them, which was how to get it over the curbing! They hadn't planned for that. The sidewalk was a good