Page:C N and A M Williamson - The Lightning Conductor.djvu/236

 the daylight lingers long; still, we knew we had but an hour and a half more of it when we started. There had been a shower of rain while Aunt Mary and I were packing, and we had not been out of the hotel many minutes when we had a surprise.

Jimmy was driving along a paved street, slimy with fresh mud, and confusing with the dash and clash of electric street cars, which Jimmy is English enough to call "trams." He tried to pass one on the off side, but just as he was getting ahead of it another huge car came whizzing along from the opposite direction. I didn't say a word. I just "sat tight," but I had the queerest feeling in my feet as if I wanted to jump or do something. It looked as if we were going to be pinched right between the two, and I'd have given a good deal if Brown had been at the helm, for I would have been sure that somehow he'd contrive to get us through all right. But Jimmy lost his head and indeed there are only a few men who wouldn't, for the drivers of both cars were furiously clanging their bells, and the whole world seemed to be nothing but noise, noise, and great moving things coming every way at once. He jammed on the brakes suddenly, which was just what Brown in the tonneau was trying to warn him not to do, and before I knew what had happened our automobile waltzed round on the road with a slippery sort of slide, the way your foot does when you step on ice under snow.

I thought we were finished, and I'm afraid I shut my eyes. "Just like a girl!" O yes, thank you; I know that; but I didn't know it or anything else at that minute. There was loud shouting and swearing,