I can
pretty nearly guess, now, what it was."

"What?" asked Mr. Damon.

"Well, some chauffeur was out for a ride in his employer's car without
permission. He got here, had an accident--maybe some friends he took
for a ride were hurt and they called for help. The chauffeur knew if
there was any publicity he'd be blamed, and so he got away as quickly
as he could. Guess the accident--if that's what it was--didn't amount
to much, or they couldn't have run the car off. We've had our trouble
for our pains."

"Well, maybe you're right, Tom Swift, but all the same, I'd like to
have a look among those trees," said Mr. Damon.

"Oh. we'll look, all right," assented Tom, "but I doubt if we find
anything."

And he was right. They walked in and about the little grove, flashing
the light at intervals, but beyond marks of auto wheels in the dust of
the road, which was near the clump of maples, there was nothing to
indicate what had happened.

"Though there was some sort of fracas," declared Tom. "Look where the
dust is trampled down. There were several men here, perhaps skylarking,
or perhaps it was a fight."

"Some one must have been hurt, or they wouldn't have cried for help,"
said Mr. Damon.

"Well, that's so. But perhaps it was some one not used to riding in
autos, and he may have imagined the accident was worse than it was, and
called for help involuntarily. There is no evidence of any serious
accident having happened--no spots of blood, at any rate," and Tom
laughed at his own grimness. "It was a new car, too, or at least one
with new tires on."

"How do you know?" asked Mr. Damon.

"Tell by the plain marks of the rubber tread in the dust," was the
answer. "Look," and Tom pointed to the wheel marks in the focus of his
electric lamp. "It's a new tire, too, with square protuberances on the
tread instead of the usual diamond or round ones. A new kind of tire,
all right."

He and Mr. Damon remained for a few minutes looking about the place
whence had come the calls for help, and then the eccentric man remarked:

"Well, as long as we can't do anything here, Tom, we might as well
travel on; what do you say?"

"I agree with you. There isn't any use in staying. We'll get the Air
Scout fixed up and travel back home. But this was something queer,"
mused Tom. "I hope it doesn't turn out later that a crime has been
committed, and we didn't show enough gumption to prevent it."

"We couldn't prevent it. We heard the crie