The Motor Girls on Cedar Lake | Page 2

your way on the water," Cora went on.
"My!" exclaimed Bess as she stepped in after her hostess. "This is
really--scrumptious!"
"You take the seat in the stern, Belle, and Bess, you may sit here near
me," said Cora, "as I suppose you will be interested in seeing how it
works. Oh! There is the steamer from the train. Hurry! Perhaps there
are folks aboard we know. Let us act at home, and pretend we have
been running motor boats all our lives."
Cora took her place at the engine and before Bess or Belle had really
gotten seated she was turning on the gasoline.
"You see this is the little pipe that feeds the 'gas' from the tank to the
carburetor," she explained. "Now, I just throw in the switch: that makes
the electrical connection: then I have to give this fly wheel--it's
stiff--but I have to swing it around so! There!" and the wheel "flew"
around twice slowly and then began to revolve very rapidly. "Now we
are ready," and the engine started its regular chug chug.
"How do you steer?" asked Bess anxiously, for the big steamer with its
cargo of summer folks seemed rather near.
"I can steer here," and Cora turned a wheel amidships, "or one may
steer at the bow. Suppose you take the forward wheel Bess, as I may,
have enough to do to look after the engine."
"Very well," acquiesced the girl, "but I hope I make no mistakes."
"Oh you won't. Just turn the wheel the way you want to go. Now we'll
hurry. I want to show off my boat."

Bess took up her place at the steering wheel and turned it so that the
boat started on a clear course. Everything seemed to work beautifully,
and presently Bess was so interested in the gentle swerving of the craft,
as the rudder responded to her slightest touch, that she, too, thought it
very much simpler than motoring on land.
"There are the Blakes!" suddenly exclaimed Belle. "See, they are
waving to us."
"Yes," answered Cora as she snatched off her cap and fluttered a
response to the folks on the steamer. "Bess, keep clear out. The landing
is just over there! The steamer makes quite a swell."
Bess turned, but she did it too suddenly. A wave from the steamer
caught them broadside, and drenched the girls before they knew what
had happened.
"Oh!" screamed Belle, "--we are running right into the steamer!"
"Bess! Bess!" called Cora. "Turn! I can't connect--"
Shouts from the steamer added to their confusion. Would they be run
down on this, their very first attempt at navigation?
"They are the motor girls!" Cora heard some one on the steamer shout,
and while this much has been told it may be well to acquaint the reader
with further details of the situation. The Motor Girls were friends
whom we have met in the four previous volumes of this series entitled
respectively: "The Motor Girls," "The Motor Girls on a Tour," "The
Motor Girls at Lookout Beach," and "The Motor Girls Through New
England." In each of these volumes we have met Cora Kimball, the
handsome, dashing girl who conquers everything within reason, but
who, herself, is occasionally conquered, both in the field of sports and
in the field of human endeavors. It was she who had the first
automobile, her Whirlwind and while out in it she had some very trying
experiences.
In the first volume she managed to unravel the mystery of the road.

Bess and Bell, the Robinson twins, were with her, as they were again in
the second volume, the story of a strange promise. This promise, odd as
it was, all three girls kept, to the delight and happiness of little Wren,
the crippled child. Next the girls went to Lookout Beach, where they
had plenty of good fun, as well as time enough to find the runaways,
two very interesting young girls, who had decamped from the
"Strawberry patch." It was like a game of hide and seek, but in the end
the motor girls did capture the runaways. Then in the story "Through
New England," it was Cora who was hidden away by the gypsies, and
what she endured, and how she escaped were assuredly wonderful.
There were brothers and friends of course, Jack Kimball being the most
important person of the first variety, while Walter Pennington and Ed
Foster were friends in need and friends indeed.
And now we find these same girls undertaking a new role--that of
running a motor boat, the gift of Mrs. Kimball to her daughter, for that
mother, in her days of widowhood, had learned how safe it was to
repose confidence in her two children, Cora and Jack.
The camp at Cedar Lake had been