Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1911-01-29

earth banked road and unable to dodge to
the side.
3We're in it for now!" said Robley quietly.
you'll have to race to escape it."
Thurley glanced behind again, and then
at the road ahead. ave can't pick up the
speed she said, calmly enough, making
every possible move to give her motor power.
"And some trolley cars are blocking ahead,
and a danger flag or something in the way!"
@Good God Those children!' muttered
Stuyverant. dts they or us, or maybe
both, in spite of all we can do"
He expected that he and Thurley would
be saved, not by their possible speed ahead,
but rather by some frightful plunge the
comet behind must presently make, with no
sentient control at the wheel. But, still by
that singular perversity of inanimate things,
the runaway mechanism chung to the road as
if some unseen, ghostly hand was laid to
guide it to deadly course and reap greater
harvest.
"Gainingp Stuyverant cried in helpless
horror, while Thurley, bending every energy
to urge the car faster and faster, abruptly
saw mass of rock and earth debris piled
from a broken water main across her only
course They shot past the first of the troll
lev cars stalled on their tracks and were in
a cA de sac.
Passengers, conductor, and motornan
shrieked as they saw the impending doom,
where the dead mans chariot held lurch-
ingly, almost Indignantly, to the road and
crept upon the rear of Robley's car.
Stuyverant was kneeling in his seat, help
lessly transfxed by the awful stare OF the
dead mans face, now a few rods only away.
He had never seen anything more frightful,
more repellent, in his life. fearful in
tensity had set its mark on the mask Of
death, till the face bore look of murderous
hate which chilled the blood in Robleys
veins.
THURLEY stood up, or half stood up, by
the wheel Il am going to let it strike!"
she cried ats the only way!'
She meant the racer was bound to over
take them despite her utmost efforts. Dis
aster blocked the road ahead. The machine
behind had gone amuck-and Death was at
the helm.
She dared not slack to receive the blow.
Her only hope was to hold her speed and so
accept the impact with as small jar as such
momentum would allow.
She was glancing alternately out ahead to
steer, and behind to receive the plunging
comet of steel and force SO madly hurting
upon them, her face as gray as stone.
Inch by inch the fire belching engine of
doom was creeping up, in their dust. 1t
struck lump of something in the road,
lurching horribly over, struck another that
instantly righted the forward wheels, and
leaped onward as if angered by delay.
Forward, backward, Thurley's glance was
flung, and then, with a sudden twisting of
the Wheel she swerved aside for the breadth
of hand and the monster behind rammed
viciously up against the car, its head lamps
shattered with crash of glass and metal, its
two front wheels, as it were, closely sand
wiched with the rear ones of the Stuyverant
machine while its radiator crumpled on the
springs and tonneau of the flying obstacle
encountered.
There was one huge jolt which sat Thurley
down; but her hands were still glued to the
wheel She kicked off her clutch and lightly
applied her brake. Her own motor, discon-
nected from the driving gear, raced in the
widest uproar.
She held to the road, thrusting harder on
the brake, till presently driven only by the
madly ramming machine behind, she was
hating the interlocked cars. The weight of
her own big tourer was slowing the racer at
the rear to impotent snarling and inertia,
when Stuyverant clambered heedlessly over
tonneau and all, leaped to the car where the
dead man sat- and stilled the laboring motor.
Ahead thew had barely another hundred