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Updated: April 30, 2025
"Do you see the girl in that car?" yelled Burgess to his companion over the din of their streaking machines. "Yes. We want that party for more than speeding, I guess," answered Blount. They bent low over their handle-bars and raced on. "If he takes the 'S' curve like that we've got him dead or alive," said Burgess. "And it looks as if he would. By George, he is!"
Such a trail, called a "sidling" trail in the vernacular of mushing, is always difficult and laborious to travel, for the sled slips continually off it into the loose snow or the ice cracks, and often for long stretches at a time one man must hold up the nose of the sled while the other toils at the handle-bars.
Romantic possibilities of accident lurked in the worn thread of the screw that adjusted the saddle, in the precarious pedals, in the loose-knit chain, in the handle-bars, above all in the brakes and tyres. Tappings and clankings and strange rhythmic creakings awoke as the intrepid hirer pedalled out into the country.
All night long the splendour kept up, and all night long, as the dogs went at a good clip and one of us rode while the other was at the sled's handle-bars, we gazed and marvelled at its infinite variety, at its astonishing fertility of effect, at its whimsical vagaries, until the true dawn of Easter swallowed up the beauty of the night as we came in sight of Eagle.
Tom showed a taste for mechanics, and his father wisely decided that such training as his son needed could be given at home to better advantage than in a school or college. Lessons over, Tom hurried to his own particular shop, and began taking apart the damaged motor-cycle. "First I'll straighten the handle-bars, and then I'll fix the motor and transmission," he decided.
Then the race was called, and a pistol shot sent the five young athletes bending low over their handle-bars spinning down the course. They all wore the club colors of scarlet and white; but from Rod's bicycle fluttered the bit of blue ribbon that Dan had been sent to the young captain's room to get, and which he had hastily knotted to the handle-bar of his machine just before starting.
Handle-bars and seat-posts were shortened to save weight, and even the leather baggage-carriers, fitting in the frames of the machines, which we ourselves had patented before leaving England, were replaced by a couple of sleeping-bags made for us out of woolen shawls and Chinese oiled-canvas.
"You ought to get a good one for that," she laughed, "all bright parts nickel, I suppose; indeed, you should get a real silver frame and gold handle-bars for that, don't you think? Well, it would be nice all the same to have your company a few miles, especially as it's growing dark," she added. "Especially as it's growing dark," I repeated. "You won't be going much farther to-night.
With a rope rough-lock around the sled runners, one man took the gee pole and another the handle-bars and each spread-eagled himself through the loose deep snow to check the momentum of the sled, until sled and men turned aside and came to a stop in a drift to avoid a steep, smooth pitch.
It was too cold to remain idle long. Folsom's damp body began to chill, so he spoke to his team and once more heaved upon the handle-bars. Leaving the crest of the ridge behind, the dogs began to run; they soon brought up in a tangle at the road-house door. When Harkness did not appear in answer to his name Folsom entered, to find his trail-mate at the bar, glass in hand. "Put that down!"
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