Читать книгу Frank Merriwell's Setback; Or, True Pluck Welcomes Defeat онлайн

8 страница из 77

Stopping by a spring for a drink, he leaned the wheel against a fence, and a country youth came forward to look it over. Dick would have thought nothing of this if the young fellow had not asked him if he thought he received enough pay for that kind of work.

“Not doing it for pay,” said Dick.

“Y’ain’t racin’ ag’in time, then?” was the bland question.

“Not exactly.”

“Can’t say that I want to buy the wheel!”

“I haven’t any notion of selling it.”

Then the countryman stared at him.

“You ain’t Jimmy Michael?”

“Jimmy Michael, the famous bicyclist? No. What made you think so?”

“And ain’t you advertisin’ a new kind of wheel that’s a world corker?”

“Nothing of the kind.”

The country lad flushed and moved away with explanation.

“What’s the matter with the fellow?” Starbright thought. “Jimmy Michael? Nobody could mistake me for Jimmy Michael!”

Still the farmers stared at him as he wheeled by. Sometimes, when they beheld him coming, they came close down to the road, often the whole family, and stared after him as he passed on.