The Argosy, Vol. 82, No. 3 — page 150: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

524 then stick to the machine as long as he could. The marvel of it was that he usually stuck to the finish. Although a horrible bonehead, he seemed to be a natural motor- cycle rider. That was the only way to account for it. The fellows began to have a little respect for Ole after trying to ride behind him for a few miles. We soon found out what was the matter—he simply didn’t know the meaning of the word fear, and would go slithering around a curve at fifty per hour, while the experienced riders were glad to slow down to twenty-five or thirty.” Any- where and everywhere, Ole’s Regal led the bunch. But even the growing respect the fellows felt for the Swede couldn’t prevent their putting it over on him in all sorts of ways. He was soon wise to most of the common tricks, but could always be depended on to rise at a new one like a hungry masca- longe. Gradually, though, they eased up on him —that is, all but Jud Thompkins. Jud rode a Tornado, but he hung around the Regal joint more than anywhere else; not that we gave him any encouragement, for he was just about as welcome as a dose of ivy poisoning. Jud was homely to look at, with his freckled face and red hair, and he assayed fully 999.10 per cent pure meanness. His meanness came out in practical jokes which were usually about as funny as a pair of crutches; but Jud regarded himself as a true humorist. From his own account of it he had Montgomery and Stone fanned up into the backwoods, begging for help on bended knees. Jud didn’t try his stuff on regular mem- bers of the motorcycle crowd, for he knew well enough what would drop on him, and Jud Thompkins never went gunning for trouble; his yellow streak was wider than the Father of Waters in flood time. But the way he opened up on poor Ole Swensen wouid make a potato weep. The best you could say about the line he pulled was that it was downright dirty. One of Jud’s favorites was to take the plugs out of Ole’s motor, pinch the points together, and put them back. Then, of course, the boat wouldn’t run. Every so often he’d squirt the breaker- box of the mag full of oil, and after Ole got wise to that one, he began shooting THE ARGOSY. the oil in around the carbon brushes, so that they couldn’t pick up any current from the revolving armature. His most innocent stunt was to let the air out of tires and throw away the valve- caps. Once or twice we suspected him of using a short cut to deflation—an dwl through the tire—but if Jud actually did that he was too careful of his precious self to get caught at it. And Ole took all this without a whimper —never objected and never seemed to get mad. As long as he was satisfied, it was none of our funeral, but you bet we were getting horribly sick of Jud Thompkins. ‘“ Tf Ole would only use his bean a little, he wouldn’t let Jud slip it over on him so easy,” sighed Jimmy Conway. ‘ And if he only had a little pep to his backbone, the big stiff would knock Jud’s head into the middle of next week. That feller’s got an awful fall coming if it ever gets here, but I’m afraid it ll hit a short circuit on the way.” About that time Jud began crowing over - the speed of his Tornado. He really did have some excuse for crowing, as she was a mighty fast boat. All of us tried a crack at him on the road, but it was no use, and Jud always managed to slip out of a speed test with Ole; an eel had nothing on him. But finally he noticed that Ole’s motor was falling off a bit. Her cylinder-heads had never been scraped, and both were well caked with carbon, which is mighty effect- ive at knocking the zip out of a gas engine. So he blew into the shop with his own bus all tuned up, fit as a fiddle, and be- gan kidding Ole to race with him—right away, that afternoon. Jenks put his car into the arrange- ments, because he knew Jud’s game all the way through, and wanted time to tune up the Swede’s machine. He was already losing some business on account of the Tornado beating so many of his Regals— though the latter was by far the better of the two machines—and he wanted to spill the beans. Ole wouldn’t listen to him, though; seemed keen to race. “And how about a little bet on the side, Ole?” says Thompkins, seeing Ole was fall- ing for his proposition. ‘Say ten bones?” ‘““Ya-as, Ay tank so,” drawled Ole. ‘“Ve'll let Mr. Yenks hold the money,” and he peeled a ten-spot out of an old yellow wallet. (C@) oO KK (C@)