CHAPTER XXII
A PUNCTURE
Tim's rush had been so swift, so silent, so effectual, that he wasalready running beside his cycle and preparing to mount before the threemen down the track, more than a quarter of a mile away, became awarethat something was wrong. The first intimation was the pounding of thehorses' hoofs as they took flight. They looked up to see the cause ofthe sudden stampede, but Tim was hidden from them by the gallopinganimals, which were dashing downhill at so desperate a pace that thetroopers, if they waited for them, must be almost inevitably swept offthe narrow track over the precipice. Though they now heard the yells ofthe mounted trooper above, they durst not delay, but promptly wheeledround and set off to head the race, intending to pull up as soon as thefrantic beasts behind them had recovered from their fright.
Meanwhile the shouts of their comrade had brought the other menhurriedly to the mouth of the cave, which they reached just in time tosee Tim disappear round a curve in the track. They plunged through thescrub, and screamed with rage when they caught sight of the crowd ofhorses headed by the three troopers far down the hill to their right.Men of southern blood make little attempt to control their feelings, andthese Peruvians, their vision of L500 vanished, stamped and gesticulatedand wept, venting bitter curses upon the hapless trooper whom Tim hadfelled, and who was now sitting up and dizzily feeling his chin.
It was the presence of the three men on the track that had determinedTim to ride northward. With them waiting for him, ready to shoot as hepassed, or before, there would have been little chance of successfullyrunning the gauntlet. He had not reckoned on the stampeding of thehorses; nor had it occurred to him at the first moment to follow attheir heels and snatch an opportunity of slipping through in theconfusion. When he did think of it, he felt very much annoyed withhimself for being so stupid. Not that he could have run past them: hisexperience on the track soon proved that the attempt would have beenhopeless. Paradoxical as it may appear, this only deepened hisannoyance. Three of the horses had started up instead of down the hill.The ascent being rather steep, they were more fatigued than frightenedbefore they had run a mile. The gallop became a trot, the trot a walk,and they were making up their simple minds to stop and refreshthemselves with herbage from the side of the track when a creature ontwo wheels came up to meddle. At the appearance of the bicycle theykicked up their heels and fled, all their terrors revived.
It was now that Tim was angry with himself. If this was the effectuphill, what would it have been in the other direction? Flying downhillafter the troop, with a judicious use of his hooter he might have keptthem all madly on the run, and even driven them before him into the armsof his amiable commander. It was too late now. Tim was unreasonablyirritated. An older person might have consoled himself with thereflection that it is easy to be wise after the event.
He had intended, when he started from camp, to ride northward along thisvery track; but he wished now that he had remained at the cross-roads,even though that might have involved playing nap with Colonel Zegarra,or making himself amiable to that gentleman's lady friends. There wasdanger behind him; there might be still graver danger ahead. Otherparties of the enemy might be coming down; perhaps the junction of thetracks was held by them. It was a good defensible position, coveringany possible attack on the Inca camp by way of the eastern route. Ifthere had been any other path home, Tim might have taken it and bolted,without any reason to feel that he was a coward. But there was none; hewas compelled to follow this only track--committed to an attempt to makethe round.
There was not much reason to fear pursuit. The men whom he had trickedat the cave had lost their steeds; the other three would perhaps have toride for many a mile in the wrong direction. Like John Gilpin, theycould not help it. By the time they had checked the stampeded animalsand brought them up the hill, a good many miles would separate them fromthe quarry who had baffled them. Tim felt quite easy on that score.
He began to take a little amusement in the chase in which he was, forhis own part, involuntarily engaged. The riderless horses in front ofhim were not at all happy. They would gallop up the steeper inclines,out-distance the strange thudding creature behind them, and when they nolonger heard its snorts, slow down and begin to take things easy. Buton the more level portions of the track, and the occasional downwardgradients, the machine made four or five yards to their one. They hadno sooner settled down into an amble than the pertinacious pursuer camepanting at their heels, and taking fresh alarm, they dashed onfrantically until another rise gave muscle the advantage of mechanism.So it went on for eight or ten miles, until the horses must havethought--if horses think--that they were doomed to drop at length fromexhaustion, and fall a prey to the modern centaur.
But Fate, after all, was kind to them. Tim suddenly became aware of thatunpleasant sensation, abominable to every cyclist, which announces apunctured tyre. There was no loud bang, like the report of a monsterpop-gun, such as sometimes startles pedestrians in the street, and makeshorses tremble or prance. The air was oozing gradually away; moment bymoment the rear tyre became softer and slacker; and Tim had to stop atonce before irreparable damage was done.
Here was a disaster, the more serious because the track was no longerflanked by a cliff on one side and a precipice on the other, but ranalong the crest of an exposed ridge, from which he could see a long waybefore and behind and on either hand. He could see--he might also beseen. The track afforded no cover, the country at either side verylittle. If he wheeled the cycle to right or left in search of asheltered nook in which to make his repairs, he would spend much time ingetting there and back again. The enemy were doubtless now hot inpursuit. Missing the tracks of his wheels they would hunt for him, andhere there was no cave, no waterfall, only a scattered bush or two. Theywould easily find him, and then!...
Tim sprang off the machine in a hurry. His only chance was to mend it onthe track. He rested it against a rock, shot a glance around, then kneltto examine the tyre. Now, as every one knows, it is sometimes not easyto locate a puncture. Tim hoped that it would not be a case ofimmersing the tube in water, for that would involve going down to theriver half a mile away. Luckily the puncture was a fairly large one,and easily seen. The outer cover of the tyre was cut through for abouttwo inches, and the perforation had extended to the inner tube.
He opened the pouch in which he carried a few small tools and materialfor making temporary repairs. From it he took a phial of rubbersolution, a strip of canvas, and a "gaiter"--a thickness of rubbervulcanised to two or three layers of strong canvas, shaped to the tyre,with hooks at the bottom. The first step was to repair the inner tube.This he did by smearing the cut with the solution and sticking on arubber patch. Then he fastened the canvas by means of the solution tothe inside of the outer cover, over the rent, to prevent the inner tubefrom being chafed by the rough edges made by the cut. The lastoperation was to fix the gaiter to the rim by its hooks. All this tooksome time. In tyre mending, as in other things, the more haste the lessspeed. Tim worked with deliberate care, glancing up and down the trackfrom time to time. At last, after about half an hour's work, hestraightened himself, satisfied that the tyre was good for a few hundredmiles, and much relieved that he had been able to complete the repairswithout interruption.
It only remained to inflate the tyre. He had just inserted the pumpwhen a succession of faint irregular clicks fell on his ear. Turninghastily, he looked down the track. He had a good view of it for half amile. At that distance it curved out of sight, but was visible againfor a short stretch a mile lower down, and still farther in patches.The air was very clear; every tree and hillock was sharply defined inthe sunlight; there was nobody in sight.
But the clicks were growing louder; they seemed to be the sounds ofiron-shod hoofs upon the rocky ground. He gazed down the track, passingfrom patch to patch over the intervening bluffs and the stretches ofrough country where it was not visible.
The sounds came beyond questionfrom his left; still he could see nobody.
Meanwhile he was pumping hard, keeping his head turned in the directionof the sounds. All at once he caught sight of six or seven dark specksmoving towards him along the sunlit track. He guessed that they wereabout a mile away. There was just time to fill his tyre before theycame up with him.
The pursuers were now hidden by a curve in the track. He pumped on; thetyre was almost fully inflated. Suddenly he heard a shout, and saw ahorseman round the bend half a mile below. He instantly whipped off thepump, turned the petrol tap, and had run a yard or two with the machinewhen he remembered that in his haste he had left his pouch on theground. He could not afford to lose that. Backing, he recovered it,thrust it into his pocket, and in another twenty seconds was runningslowly up the hill.
Glancing over his shoulder, he saw five men galloping after him. Theywere no more than a quarter-mile away, shouting, urging their horses totheir utmost speed, gaining on him. But the crest of the hill was near;then the track was level for a while; then had a downward incline. Theengine worked well; the cycle breasted the slope, gained the flat, andsped on at forty miles an hour.
A minute after Tim topped the crest, the horsemen reached the same spoton their panting steeds. They yelled with rage and disappointment whenthey saw their quarry bowling along at a speed that a Pegasus mightenvy. One took a shot at him, but Tim, bending over the handle-bar,offered a low target, and escaped injury. In two minutes he had turneda corner and was out of sight.