THE ARMORED CAR
The three talked, because they were in the dark, and because they felt
great joy over their escape. The clouds, after a while, floated away,
and the thunder ceased to mutter. It seemed that the elements played
with them, but, for the present, were in their favor. The walking itself
was pleasant, as they were anxious to exercise their muscles after the
long hard waiting in the grove.
But as the clouds went away and the stars came out, leaving a sky of
blue, sown with stars, John could not keep from looking upward often.
The aeroplanes and the daring men who flew them had made a tremendous
impression upon him, and he constantly expected danger. But he saw none
of those ominous black specks which could grow so fast into sinister
shapes. He heard instead a faint rumbling ahead of them on the road to
Courville, and he held up his hand as a warning.
"What is it?" asked Carstairs, as the three stopped.
"I don't know yet," replied John, "but the sound seems to be made by
wheels."
"Perhaps a belated peasant driving home," said Wharton, as he listened.
"I don't think so. It appears to be a volume of sound, although it's as
yet far away. I hear it better now. It's wheels and many of them."
"French reinforcements."
"Maybe, but more likely German. We've seen how ready the Germans are,
and we know that they're spreading all over this region."
"Then it's safer for us out of the road than in it."
There was a hedge on either side of the road, but the three slipped
easily through the one on the right, and stood in tall grass. The
rumbling was steadily coming nearer, and John had no doubt it was made
by Germans, perhaps some division seeking to get in the rear of the
French forces with which he had fought.
There was a good moon and they saw well through the thin hedge. In ten
minutes cyclers, riding six abreast, appeared on the crest of a low hill
in the direction of Courville. The moonlight fell on their helmets and
gray uniforms, showing, as John had expected, that they were Germans.
Again he was beholding an example of the wonderful training and
discipline, which had been continued for decades and which had put
military achievement above everything else. Day and night the German
hosts were advancing on France.
The cyclers, carrying their rifles before them, advanced in hundreds and
hundreds, the files of six keeping perfectly even. Again the sight was
unreal, productive of awe. Armies had never before gone to battle like
this. The files close together, like a long, grayish-green serpent,
moved swiftly along the road.
But it was not the wheels that had made the rumble. They instead gave
out a light undulating sound, something like that of skaters on ice, and
the three waited to see what was behind, as the rumbling grew louder.
The cyclers passed, then came the strong smell of gasoline, puffing
sounds and the head of a great train of motor cars appeared. Most of the
motors were filled with soldiers, others drew cannon and provision
wagons. They were a full hour in passing, and at the rear were more than
a hundred armored cars, also crowded with troops, some of them carrying
machine guns also.
"I wish we were in one of those armored cars," said John, "then we
wouldn't miss our horses."
"Well, why not get in one of them," said Carstairs.
"While we're about it why not wish for everything else that we can think
of?"
"I mean exactly what I say. I didn't speak until I saw an opportunity.
One of the cars seems to have something the matter with it and is
drawing up by the side of the road not fifteen feet from us. The others
have gone on, expecting it of course to catch up soon."
"Do you really mean what you suggest, Carstairs?" asked Wharton.
"I certainly do."
"Then what an Englishman suggests Yankees will perform."
"But with the help of the Englishman. Jove, what luck! There are only
two men with the car. One is standing beside it, and the other is
crawling under it. The machine is almost in the shadow of the hedge, and
if we're smooth about it we can slip through, and be upon it, before
we're seen."
"We must time ourselves. What's the plan?" asked Wharton.
"We'll assume when the man comes out from under the machine that he's
fixed it. Then we'll make our rush, knock down the other fellow, jump
into it and away. I'm an expert chauffeur, and I don't ask a better
chance. Oh, fellows, what luck!"
"It's certainly favoring us," said Wharton, "and we must push it. It
would be a crime to quit with such luck as this leading us on."
They slipped noiselessly through the hedge, and stood in its heavy
shadow only a few feet from the car. They heard the man under it tapping
with metal on metal. The other standing with his back to the three said
a few words and the man replied.
"He says it's only a trifle, and it's all right now," whispered
Carstairs, who understood German. "He's coming out from under the car.
Now, fellows, for it!"
John struck the man standing beside the car with the butt of his rifle,
but he did not make the blow hard--he could not bring himself to kill
anybody in that manner. But the man fell senseless, and, just as his
partner came from beneath it, the three leaped into the car, Carstairs
threw on the speed, whirled about on air, it seemed to John, and left
the German in the road, staring open-mouthed.
But the German recovered quickly and uttered a shout of alarm, drawing
the attention of the armored motors, the rear files of which were not a
hundred yards away.
"Down, you fellows!" cried Carstairs, who now took the lead. "Have your
rifles ready to fire back, and enjoy what is going to be the greatest
ride of your lives!"
Some wild spirit seemed to have taken hold of the Englishman. An expert
driver, it may have been the touch of the wheel under his hand at such
an exciting moment, and then it may have been the shots from the German
cars that, in an instant, rattled upon the steel sides protecting the
car.
"Hold fast, you fellows!" cried Carstairs, who bent low over the wheel,
his flashing eyes now seeking to trace the road before them. "We are
going to eat up the ground!"
The car gave its last dizzy lurch as it completed its circuit and shot
ahead. John and Wharton had been thrown together, but they held on to
their rifles and righted themselves. Then John noticed beside him the
body and barrels of a machine gun, mounted and ready for use. He was the
sharpshooter of the three and that gun appealed to him, as the car had
appealed to Carstairs.
"Move over a little!" he shouted to Wharton.
"What are you going to do?"
"I'm going to fight that pursuing German army."
In an instant the machine gun began to crackle like a box of exploding
crackers, sending back a hail of bullets which rattled upon the pursuing
cars or found victims in them. But they, crouching down, were completely
protected by the armor, and their careering machine made but a single
target while they could fire into the pursuing mass.
Carstairs bent lower and lower. He had gone completely wild for the
moment. Millions of sparks flew before his eyes. All the big and little
pulses in his head and body were beating heavily. They had just scored
two great triumphs. They had defeated the efforts of the masters of the
air, and they had taken from their foe one of his most formidable
weapons in which they might escape. His soul flamed with triumph, and
that old familiar touch of the wheel filled him with the strength not of
one giant, but of ten. He saw the road clearly now. There it lay ahead
of them, long, white and sinuous, and he never doubted for a moment his
ability to guide the armored car along in it at a mile a minute.
John in his turn was filled with the rage of battle. It was not often
that one in his situation had a deadly machine gun at hand, ready to
turn upon his enemies. While Wharton fed it from the great supply of
ammunition in the car he turned a perfect stream of balls upon the
pursuing motor, spraying it from side to side like a hose. Wharton
looked up at his white strained face, in which his eyes burned like two
coals of fire, and then he looked at the bent back and shoulders of
Carstairs.
"Two madmen," he muttered. "A Britisher and a Yankee, mad at the same
time and in the same place, and I'm their keeper! Good Lord, did a man
ever before have such a job!"
Once he pulled John down a little as the machine guns in the pursuing
car were getting the range, but behind the armored sheath of their car
they were safe, for the present at least. Wharton regained his coolness
and retained it. But he held to his belief that he rode a race with
death, with one madman in front of him and another by his side.
Now and then the car took a frightful leap, and Wharton expected to land
beneath it, but it always came down right, with Carstairs driving it
faster and faster and Scott pouring balls from the machine gun and
talking to it lovingly, as if it were a thing of life.
It was Wharton's grim thought that he was about to die soon, but that he
would die gloriously. No common death for him, but one amid the crash of
motors, machine guns and cannon. Meanwhile steel rained around them, but
they were protected by the speed of their flight, and their armor. It
was hard for the Germans to hit a fleeting target in a curving road, and
the few balls or bullets that struck true fell harmless from the steel
plates.
Wharton's own blood began to leap. The two with him in the car might be
madmen, but they showed skill and vigor in their madness. The car sprang
in the air, but it always came down safely. It whirled at times on a
single wheel, but it would right itself, and go on at undiminished
speed.
And the other madman at the gun did not neglect precautions. He kept
himself well hidden behind the steel shield, and continued to spray the
pursuing line from right to left and from left to right with a stream of
projectiles.
On flew the car, down valleys and up slopes. It thundered across little
ridges, and fled through strips of forest. Then Wharton amid their own
roar heard the same deep steady rumble that had preceded the coming of
the first German force. The sound was so similar he knew instinctively
that it was made by a second detachment, advancing along the same road,
but miles back. Their own headlong speed would carry them directly into
it, and, as he saw it, they were completely trapped.
He leaned over, put a hand on the shoulder of Carstairs, and shouted in
his ear:
"A second army of the enemy is in front, and we're going into it at the
rate of a mile a minute!"
"Never mind!" Carstairs shouted back. "I know a little road not far
ahead, leading off from this almost due westward. I'm going to take it,
but it's a sharp turn. Hold tight you two!"
"For God's sake, Carstairs, slow up a little on the curve!"
But Carstairs made no answer. He did not even hear him now. He lay
almost upon the wheel, and his eyes never left the track in front of
him. He was the jockey riding his horse to victory in the greatest of
all races.
Wharton ceased to feed the machine gun. The use for it had passed now.
They were rapidly gaining on the pursuit, but the same speed was
bringing them much nearer to the second force. He wondered if Carstairs
really knew of that branch road, or if it were some wild idea flitting
through his mad brain. As it was, he laid his rifle on the floor of the
car, and commended his soul to God.
"Now!" suddenly shouted Carstairs, and it seemed to Wharton that they
were whirling in a dizzy circle. Carstairs boasted afterwards that they
made the curve on one wheel, but Wharton was quite sure that they made
it on air.
They shot into a narrow road, not much more than a path leading through
woods, and when Wharton looked back the pursuit was not in sight. They
were now going almost at a right angle from either force, leaving both
far behind, and Wharton suggested to Carstairs that he slow down--John
had already ceased firing, because there was nothing to fire at. But his
words were in vain. Carstairs would not yet come out of his frenzy. As
John had talked to his gun he was now talking to his machine, bestowing
upon it many adjectives of praise.
Wharton gave up the task as useless and sank back in his seat. He must
let the fever spend itself. Besides he was gaining supreme confidence in
the driving of Carstairs. The Englishman had shown such superb skill
that Wharton was beginning to believe that he could drive the car a mile
a minute anywhere save in a dense forest. So, he sank back in his seat,
and relaxed mind and body.
They fled on over a road narrow but good. They passed lone farm houses
sitting back in the fields, but Wharton had only a glimpse of them. A
tile roof, a roar from the car and they were gone.
Yet the fever of Carstairs slowly burned itself out. They had long since
been safe from any pursuit by the Germans in the main road, and now the
young Englishman realized it. He took one hand from the wheel, and
dashed back a lock of hair that had fallen over his brow. Then he slowed
down quickly, and when they were going not more than seven or eight
miles an hour he said like one coming out of an ecstasy.
"Don't the Germans build splendid cars?"
"And fine machine guns, too?" said John, in a high-pitched unnatural
voice.
"Now here is where I take command," said Wharton firmly. "You two have
been madmen, as mad as anybody can be, although it's true that your
madness has saved us. But you've done your great deeds, sanity is
returning, and you're in a state of exhaustion. Carstairs, give me the
wheel at once. I'm not much of a driver, but I can take the car along
safely at a rate of five miles an hour, which is all we need now."
Carstairs, the fires within him burned out wholly now, resigned the
wheel to his comrade, and sank limply into a seat beside John.
"Now you two rest," said Wharton, sternly, "and if I hear a word out of
either of you in the next hour I'll turn the machine gun on you."
They obeyed. Each was a picture of physical collapse. Wharton did not
know much about automobiles. In the driver's seat he felt as if he were
steering a liner, but in such case as his one readily takes risks, and
he sent the machine along slowly and with fair success.
It was beginning to lighten somewhat, and he looked for a village. They
must have food, a fresh supply of gasoline, and news of their own army.
They bore letters which they meant to deliver or die.
The same beautiful country, though less hilly, stretched before them.
Many clear little streams flowed through the valleys, and here and there
were groves free from undergrowth. Wharton believed that they were far
toward the west, and near the British troops--if any had yet been
landed in France.
"Are you two still in a convalescent stage?" he asked, glancing back.
"Getting along nicely, doctor, thank you, sir," said John. "I began to
pick up just as soon as we left those German armies out of sight."
Then he turned to the comrade, sitting beside him.
"Carstairs, old man," he said, "I don't know what you are, at home, but
here you're the greatest chauffeur that ever lived! I believe you could
drive a car sixty miles an hour all day long on a single wheel!"
"Thanks, old man," said Carstairs, grasping his hand, "I didn't have
time to look back, but I knew from the sounds that you were working a
machine gun, as one was never worked before; fast enough by Jove to
drive off a whole hostile army."
"You two have organized the greatest log rolling society in existence,"
said Wharton, "but you've been brave and good boys. Now let's take a
look at this glorious car of ours which we had specially built for us in
Germany."
The light in the east was increasing, and for the first time they made
an examination of their capture. Despite the armor and presence of the
machine gun it was upholstered in unusual style, with cushions and
padded sides in dark green leather. There were many little lockers and
fittings not to be found often in a car intended for war. On a tiny
silver plate under the driver's seat a coat of arms was engraved. John,
who was the first to catch sight of it, exclaimed:
"This car belongs to some duke or prince. Carstairs, you're a subject
and not a citizen, and you ought to be up on all kinds of nobility
worship. What coat of arms is this?"
"I don't know," replied Carstairs, "and I'm as free a man as you are,
I'd have you to know."
"Breaking the treaty already," chuckled Wharton. "It doesn't matter
whether we know the coat of arms or not. It's likely that the man
standing in the road, the one whom John hit over the head with
the gun was the duke or prince. Oh, if the Germans ever get you,
Scott, they'll break you on the wheel for such an extreme case of
_Majestaetsbeleidigung!_"
"And if you pronounce that word again you'll break your jaw," said John.
"Let's open all these lockers. We may find spoils of war."
It seemed a good suggestion, and taking the monkey wrench they broke
open every locker. They found a pair of splendid field glasses, shaving
materials, other articles of the toilet, and a tiny roll of fine tissue
paper.
"I've an idea that we have something of value here," said John, as he
held up the little roll. "It's in German, which I don't understand. Take
it, Wharton."
There were six small sheets, and as Wharton translated them aloud and
slowly they realized that in very truth they had made a precious
capture. They contained neither address nor signature, but they notified
the commander of the extreme German right wing that a British force
would shortly appear near the Belgian border, on the extreme allied
left, that it would be a small army, and that it could be crushed by a
rapid, enveloping movement.
"The prince or duke whom you hit over the head, John," said Wharton,
"was carrying this. He did not put it in his pocket, because he never
dreamed of such a thing as the one that happened to him. But one thing
is sure: our obligation to reach the allied force in the west is doubled
and tripled. We three, obscure as we may be, may carry with us the fate
of an army."
"He called us two madmen," said John, nudging Carstairs. "Now look at
our good sober Wharton going mad with responsibility."
Wharton did not notice them. He was turning over and over the sheets of
tissue paper, and his eyes glowed. His hands trembled, too, as he
handled the precious document, but he did not let a single page fall.
"Glorious! splendid! magnificent!" he exclaimed. "By our capture, by our
own courage and skill, and by ours alone we'll save the allied left wing
from destruction."
The timeliness of their exploit, the wonderful chance had gone to
Wharton's head. He forgot for the time his comrades, the motor, and the
morning sun over the fields and the forest. He thought only of their
arrival in the allied camp with those precious documents.
John and Carstairs exchanged glances again. They had come quite back to
earth, but there could be no doubt that Wharton was taking an ascension.
"We'll treat him kindly," said Carstairs.
"Of course," said John. "Old friend of ours, you know. Been with us
through the wars. But I want to tell you, Carstairs, and I hope I won't
hurt your feelings, you being a monarchist, that I'm glad I hit that
prince such a solid smash over the head. It will always be a pleasure to
me to remember that I knocked out a royalty, and I hope he wasn't any
mediatized prince either."
"Don't apologize to me. He was only a German prince, and they're so
numerous they don't count British princes are the real thing."
"Stop talking foolishness you two!" exclaimed Wharton. "You ramble on,
and we carry the fate of Europe in our hands! My God, we've wasted a
quarter of an hour here talking! Carstairs, get back in the driver's
seat, and I don't care how fast you drive! Scott, take your place at the
machine gun, and shoot down anything that opposes us!"
"Mad! Quite mad!" John and Carstairs said together, but they obeyed with
amazing promptness, and in a minute the car was spinning down the road
at a great rate. But Wharton leaning forward and looking with red eyes
in black rims, saw nothing they passed. He had instead a vision of the
three arriving at some point far away with the prince's dispatches, and
of English and French generals thanking those who had come in time to
save them.
Carstairs drove with a steady hand, but he was his normal self now. He
had seen that their supply of gasoline was sufficient to last a while,
and he was content for the present with a moderate rate of speed. If
they were pursued again then he could make another great burst, but he
did not consider it likely that a third force of the foe would appear.
They must be getting beyond the vanguard of the German invasion.
John sat beside Wharton. The machine gun was at rest, but he kept his
rifle across his knee. Nevertheless he did not anticipate any further
danger. He felt an immense satisfaction over their achievements, but the
danger and strain had been so great that rest seemed the finest thing in
the world. He hoped they would soon come to another of those neat French
inns, where they would surely be welcome.
But Wharton was not thinking of inns and rest. He took out the
dispatches and read them a second time. Then he folded them up
triumphantly and put them back in his pocket again. His soul burned with
ardor. Their fights with the aeroplanes and the armored cars were alike
forgotten. They must get forward with the prince's dispatches.
The sun came over the slopes, and the day grew fast. John fell asleep in
his seat with his rifle across his knees. He was aroused by the stopping
of the car and the murmur of many voices. He sat upright and was wide
awake all in a moment.
They had come to the village for which they had wished so ardently and
they were surrounded by people who looked curiously at the car, the
heavy dents in its armor, the machine gun, and, with the most curiosity
of all, at the three occupants.
But their looks were friendly. The three in the car wore the French
uniform, and while obviously they were not French, it was equally
obvious that they were friends of France. John smiled at them and asked
the burning question:
"Is there an inn here?"
They pointed across the street. There it was snug and unimpeachable.
Carstairs drove slowly to the front of it, and he and John meanwhile
answered a torrent of questions. Yes, they had been in a fight with
Germans, and, after seizing one of their armored cars, they had escaped
in it. But it was true that the Germans were coming into France by all
the main roads, and the people must be ready.
There were many exclamations of dismay, and the questions they asked
John and Carstairs never ceased. But they said nothing to Wharton. His
stern, absent expression did not invite confidences. He was looking over
their heads at something far away, and he seemed merely to be going into
the inn, because his comrades were doing so.
The three found the breakfast good as usual. Gasoline could be obtained.
It was not for civilians, but as they were soldiers serving France they
were able to buy a supply. The news that they desired was scarce,
although there was a vast crop of rumors which many told as facts. John
was learning that war was the mother of lies. He believed only what men
had seen with their own eyes, and but little of that. It was incredible
how people described in detail things they had witnessed, but which had
never occurred.
Had a British army landed? It had. It had not. Where was it? It was in
Belgium. It was in France. It was at the training camps in England.
There was plenty of information, and one could choose whatever he liked
best. John and Carstairs looked at each other in dismay. They had a car,
but where were they to go. At least they carried dispatches for a
British army which some of the French believed to be in France. But
Wharton took no notice of the difficulty. He was silent, and preoccupied
with their triumphant arrival that was coming.
John asked the most questions, and at last he found a woman whose words
seemed to be based upon fact and not imagination. She had a cousin who
was employed in the telegraph, and her cousin told her, that British
troops had landed, that some of them at least had reached Paris, and
then had gone north toward Belgium, the region of Mons or Charleroi, she
believed. She spoke quietly and with much detail, and John believed that
she had a mind able to tell the truth without exaggeration.
He held a brief conference with Carstairs, who had now replenished the
gasoline, and who had also put stores of food in the car. Carstairs
agreed with him that the statement was probably correct, and that at any
rate they ought to govern themselves in accordance with it. They did not
consult Wharton, who they knew was thinking only of the papers.
John took the wheel. Like Wharton he did not know much about driving,
but it was a time when one had to do things. Carstairs soon fell asleep,
but Wharton sat rigidly erect, staring before him.
John had felt the emotion of triumph strongly that morning, but now much
of it was departing. The country was growing more beautiful than ever.
He had never seen any outside his own to match it. This had the
advantage of age and youth combined. Buildings were gray and soft with
centuries, but the earth itself was fresh and eternal with youth. But he
knew beyond any shred of doubt that it would soon be torn to pieces by
the fighting millions.
There was no occasion for haste now, as they must feel the way, and they
were beyond the German advance. While Carstairs slept and Wharton stared
ahead he examined the country. Once they passed near a town of
considerable size, and he saw on a hill, in the center of it a great
gray cathedral, its fine stonework glittering like tracery.
Then he saw the graybeards, the women, and the young boys and girls
coming into the fields to work. All the men of fighting age were gone.
He had seen the same in Germany, but it struck him anew with painful
force, this turning of millions of workers upon one another, weapons in
hand.
John stopped beside the fields once or twice and talked with the
peasants. The old men could tell him nothing. They were stolid and
stoical. Yes, there was war, but it was not any business of theirs to
find where the armies were marching, and his heart went out more
strongly than ever to the people, over whom military ambition and the
folly of kings were driving the wheels of cannon.
It was well toward midday before he secured any real information. They
encountered at the crossing of a brook a small French patrol under a
lieutenant, an intelligent man, whom by lucky chance Carstairs had met
two weeks before.
He told them that going at a moderate rate they could reach by the next
morning a large French army which lay north and west. Some British
troops--he did not know how many--had come up, and they were on the
extreme left of the allied line. More were expected. In front of them
were great masses of the Germans.
They gave him their own news, and then with mutual good wishes they
drove on, Carstairs now at the wheel, and their pace increased. It was
agreed that they should hasten much more, as soon as they were
absolutely sure of the way. Wharton, for the first time, took part in
the talk.
"When we have a definite point to aim at," he said, "we must take every
risk and race for it. If we don't deliver these documents promptly to
the generals we ought to be shot."
"We won't be shot for the lack of trying, Wharton," said John, "but if
we go racing along the wrong road we'll be that much farther from our
right direction."
"We ought to see more patrols soon," said Carstairs. "They'll surely be
watching all through this region."
"Likely enough we'll find 'em in that wood ahead," said John, pointing
to a long stretch of forest that clothed a group of hills. "It's just
the place for 'em. From the top of that highest hill they can see for
miles."
Carstairs increased their speed, and the car shot forward. It was a fine
motor, John thought, and the bombardment it had received had not hurt it
much. That German prince certainly knew how to select a car, and he had
fortified it in a splendid manner.
John was smiling to himself again in satisfaction, as they dipped down
the valley and entered the forest, which in that country they would
certainly call a great one. Its shade was pleasant, too, as the beams of
the sun were now vertical and hot.
"Nice region," said John approvingly. "See that old castle off there to
the left."
An ancient castle, decayed and abandoned, crowned a little hill. Around
it was a moat dry for generations, and one of the Norman towers had
fallen down. It was a somber picture of lonely desolation.
"I suppose some fine old robber of a baron lived in that," said John,
"and preyed upon the country, until he reached the hunting grounds of
other robbers like himself."
"Deucedly draughty and uncomfortable they must have been," said
Carstairs. "We've some of 'em in my country, but they must have been
pretty hard living for my lord and my lady."
"I don't see that we have much advantage over those old fellows," said
John thoughtfully. "They were little robbers, and here are all the
countries of Europe trying to tear one another to pieces. After all,
Carstairs, I'm beginning to think the Americans are the only really
civilized people."
Carstairs grinned.
"You can't do it, Scott," he said, "you can't take Wharton's place. I'll
argue with him about the merits of Briton and Yankee. It's his
time-honored right, but I'll have no dispute with you."
Wharton smiled a stern assent.
"Then we'll let it go," said John, "but do you notice that this is a
real forest. It must cover a half dozen square miles. I suppose that in
your country they would call it the Royal Forest or by some such
high-sounding name."
"Never you mind what we'd call it," rejoined Carstairs, "but whatever it
is it's evident that something violent is going on within its shades!
Listen!"
John started upright in his seat, as he heard the crackle of three or
four shots so close together that they were almost in a volley, and then
the sound of feet running swiftly. They stopped the machine, and a
figure, stained, bleeding and desperate, emerged from the forest.
"A fugitive!" exclaimed John.
"But from what?" said Carstairs.
"The Germans, of course!" said Wharton.
The man, stained with blood, ragged and dirty came at great bounds, and
before any one could put out a detaining hand he sprang into the car.
"Help, for God's sake!" he cried. "I'm a spy in the service of France,
and the Uhlans are coming down through the wood after me!"
"Help you!" exclaimed Carstairs. "Of course we will! Any friend of
France is a friend of ours!"
He bent low over the wheel once more in his old speeding attitude, and
the car shot forward like an arrow.