"Oh, you may laugh," said Cora somewhat indignantly, "but I don"t want anything like it to happen again. The brake would not work, and--"
"The train was just in front of us, and we were running right in it," put in Isabel, her voice far from steady, and her face still very white.
At this point Ed insisted upon telling the whole story, and he described the plight of the motor girls so graphically that both Jack and Walter were compelled to admit that Cora did indeed know how to drive a car in an emergency, and that she had acted most wisely.
"Good for you, sis!" exclaimed Jack, when the story Was finished.
"I could not have done better myself."
"Such praise is praise indeed," spoke Ed with a laugh.
He went around back to look at the brake, and found what had caused the trouble. A loose nut had fallen between the brake band and the wheel hub, and prevented the band from tightening. The trouble was soon remedied, and the brake put in working order.
"There--you are all ready for the road now," remarked Ed.
"Thank you--very much," said Cora quietly, but there was a world of meaning in her tones.
Ed looked into her eyes rather longer than perhaps was necessary.
"Come on; get in with us, Ed," invited Jack. "Haven"t seen you in an age. Let"s hear about the Detroit team."
"Oh, I"m--I"m too dirty to get in the car, I"m afraid," objected Ed, with a glance at the mud spots that were now turning to light-gray polka-dots on his clothes, in the strong sunlight.
"Nonsense!" cried Jack heartily. "Come along. Walter will drive for Cora, in case she is nervous. It needs a strong wrist in this soft ground."
"Oh, yes! Do please steer for us," begged the still trembling Isabel. "I"d feel so much safer--"
"Well, I like that!" cried Corm with a light laugh. "Is that the way you treat me, after having saved your life?"
"But it was you-who--who almost ran us into the train, Cora,"
answered Isabel, giving her friend a little pinch on her now rosy cheek. "So you see it was your duty to save us."
"Well, I did it," replied Cora, glad that she had come out of the affair with such flying colors.
Walter took Ed"s place at the steering wheel of the Whirlwind, and the fisherman seated himself beside Jack. Then Walter ran Cora"s car out of the mire of the meadow and into the road, the three girls remaining in the machine.
"I suppose if the young ladies hadn"t run you down we wouldn"t have seen you the entire summer," said Jack to Ed as he ran the smaller machine along behind the touring car.
"Oh, indeed you would," answered Ed. "I really intended looking you up in a day or two. You see, I have been very busy. What are you laughing at? Because I said I was busy? Well, I guess I have the busiest kind of business on hand. Say, let me whisper," and he leaned over confidentially, though there was no need for it, as the other auto was some distance ahead. "I"m going into finance."
"Finance?"
"Yes. Stocks--bonds--and so on, you know. Bank stocks. Think of that, Jack, my boy!"
"Good for you! Three cheers for the bank stock!" exclaimed Jack in a half whisper. "In the new bank, I suppose?"
"The correct supposition," answered Ed. "I have been invited to subscribe for some of the new issue of stock, and I"ve decided to.
I"m going over to get it in a day or two. I"m to pay partly in cash, and turn over to them some of my bonds and other negotiable securities that I inherited from father, who was a banker, you know.
I think I am making a good investment."
"Not a bit of doubt about it," said Jack. "I wish I had the chance."
"I hear that Sid Wilc.o.x wanted to get some of the stock, Jack," went on Ed. "He comes of age soon, and he will have some cash to invest.
But, somehow, there"s a prejudice against Sid. He has not been asked to take stock, though the directors rectors know he has money."
"Well, I guess the trouble is he can"t be depended on. He"d be peddling the stock all over the State, or putting it up for doubtful transactions, and I guess the directors wouldn"t like that. He"s a reckless sort. I shouldn"t mind his fits of crankiness, if he would only leave girls out. But when he goes in for some kind of mischief harmless in itself, he invariably brings some girl into it, and she has to suffer in the sc.r.a.pe with him. It"s not right of Sid.
But--speaking of angels--there he is now."
Jack"s runabout, called the Get There, had been climbing the hill back of the Whirlwind, and both machines were now on a level stretch of road and approaching Fisher"s store--an "emporium," as the sign called it, and a place where one could get anything from a watch to a shoestring, if old Jared Fisher only knew that it was wanted before he went to town.
It so happened, however, by some strange intervention of providence, that he never did know in time. But, at any rate, you could always get soda water--the kind that comes in the "push-in-the-cork bottles," and that was something.
As the two autos drew up, the occupants beheld, standing on the steps of the store, Sidney Wilc.o.x and Ida Giles. Jack halted his car behind the Whirlwind.
"h.e.l.lo there!" called out Ed. "Seems to me I"m bound to meet all my friends to-day. How are you, Sid?"
Ed leaped from Jack"s car and up the steps to greet Sid.
"Oh, I"m so-so," was the rather drawling answer. "But what"s the matter with you? Been clamming?"
"Not exactly," replied Ed, glancing down at the mud spots; "but I caught something, just the same."
"So I see," responded Sid, chuckling at his wit. "Pity to take it all, though. You should have left some for the turtles. They like mud."
Jack, who followed Ed, said something in conventional greeting to Ida. But the girl with Sid never turned her head to look in the direction of the Whirlwind. Cora remarked on this in a low voice to Isabel and Elizabeth.
"I hear that you are going in for--er--Wall Street," said Sid to Ed in rather a sarcastic voice.
"Oh, no. Nothing like that. No chance for a lamb like me in Wall Street. It"s too much of a losing game."
"Oh, I don"t know," drawled Sid. "A fellow might make good, and then do--well, better."
Ed glanced at Jack. How did Sid know about Ed"s plan to take stock in the new bank? That was a question that each youth flashed to the other.
There was something unpleasant in the manner of Sidney Wilc.o.x. All in the party seemed to feel it. And as far as the girls were concerned, they noticed much of the same manner in Ida, though Jack and Ed were not quite so critical. As for Walter, he did not seem to be giving Ida a thought. But it is doubtful if she was so indifferent toward him. Still, she would not look in his direction while Cora and her two chums were with him.
Corn walked slowly up the broad store steps; Bess and Belle following.
"I"m simply choked," said Cora with a laugh. "I never had such a thirsty run."
Ida seemed very much interested in the distant landscape.
"The roads are awfully dry," she murmured.
"And so am I," added Elizabeth as she followed her sister and Cora into the store. Walter and Jack trailed in after them, while Ed stayed for a moment outside with Ida and Sid. The latter did not introduce Ed to Ida. It was a habit Sid had, of never presenting his young men chums to his "girl," unless he could not avoid it. Ida, perhaps, knew this, and she strolled to the other end of the porch.
"How"d you make out in your exams?" asked Ed of Sid, for the latter attended college with Jack. That is, he was in his study cla.s.s, though not in the same grade socially.
"Oh, pretty fair. I cut most of "em. I finish next year, and I don"t intend to get gray hairs over any exams now."