The Motor Girls | Page 6

into that would mean almost as horrible an accident as if she collided with the train. To the right there was a field, but it was fenced in, and between it and the road was a little miry, brook.
In some places the brook widened almost into a pond. The bottom was treacherous, and to steer into it meant to sink down deeply into the mud. To run into the fence might mean that one of the rails would become entangled in the mechanism of the motor, tearing it all to pieces. Or one of the long pieces of wood might even impale the occupants of the car.
Cora's eyes swept down the length of the barrier with a flash.
There was just what she wanted! A gap in the fence!
She could go through that in safety. But suppose the machine was brought to too sudden a stop in the mud? They would all be thrown out and perhaps injured. But it was the only thing to do.
With a firm grasp of the wheel Cora sent the auto from the road.
Elizabeth screamed as she felt the swaying of the car. She had to hold her sister from being tossed but, for Isabel was incapable of taking care of herself.
Straight for the field rushed the car, the engineer of the train now tooting his whistle as if in gladness at the narrow escape.
Splash!
The auto fairly dived into the brook, and gradually slackened speed. Right toward a clump of willow trees it surged, throwing a spray of water in advance. Then it became stationary in the middle of a spot where the brook widened into a pond.
Cora was dimly conscious of a figure on the opposite bank of the stream. A figure of a young man, with a fishing-pole in his hands. She saw a spray of water, cast up by the auto, drench him. She even heard him cry out, but at that moment she gave him not a thought.
Everything centered on her narrow escape, the condition of her two chums, and, last, but not least, whether her new auto had been damaged.
Cora leaned over the side and looked at the water flowing past the mud guards.
"Safe!" she exclaimed. "I--I thought we were doomed, girls. Didn't you?"
"Doomed?" echoed Elizabeth. "I never want to go through that experience again."
"Me either," added Cora fervently. "Has Belle fainted?"
"I'm afraid so."
Cora leaned over, scooped some water up in her hand, and dashed it into the white face of the girl. Isabel opened her eyes.
"Are we--are we--" she gasped.
"We're all right, you little goose," said Cora with a laugh, though her voice trembled and her hands shook. "I guess it wasn't nearly as dangerous as it looked."
"It was bad enough," spoke Elizabeth.
"Anyhow, the auto stopped," went on Cora. "Don't you see where we are? In the middle of Campbell's Pond. And we won't have to swim out, either. It's not very deep. But, Bess, you look like a sheet, and Belle, you seem like--"
"A pillow-case, with the pillow out," added Isabel with a wan smile. "I never was so glad to get a ducking in all my life."
"And I guess we're not the only ones who got a ducking," said Cora as she shook some drops from her hair.
"Why?" inquired Bess.
"Look!" and Cora pointed across the pond. A very much drenched figure was standing up. The man with the fishing-pole was wiping the water from his face. He looked at the girls in the auto.
"Oh, dear!" exclaimed Elizabeth. "I should think we did give him a ducking!"
"I'm awfully sorry, but--but we couldn't help it," said Cora, standing up and looking at the young man.
He approached closer, began wading out into the pond toward the auto. The water was not very deep, hardly up to his knees. Cora found herself wondering how he had managed to fish in it.
He was very good-looking, each of the girls was thinking to herself.
"Can't I help you?" he asked, smiling broadly, in spite of the mud and water splashed all over him. There was actually a little globule of mud on the end of his nose. He seemed as much amused over his own predicament as he was over that of the motor girls. "Do you need any help?" he went on.
"I'm sure I--er--that is, I hardly know," stammered Cora. She was not altogether certain about the state of the auto. "I'm afraid we've been very--very impolite--to splash water, and--er--mud all over you," she added.
"Not at all--not at all," he assured her. "I never saw a better--a better turn, so to speak. You are very plucky, if I may be permitted to say so. I--er--I almost said my prayers when I saw you racing down toward the train. Then I saw you turn in here. But what happened that you couldn't stop before?"
"The brake,"