But if Orville was on time, the automobile was not, the driver not being a methodical man; and when it did come, it was all the motor-man could do to stop it. It seemed restive.
“You ought to shut off on the oats,” said Orville gayly, from his seat on the lowest step of the “stoop.”
The picture of a gentleman in immaculate evening clothes with the exception of a somewhat rococo carpet slipper, seemed to amuse some street children who were passing. If they could have followed the “auto” they would have been even more diverted, but such was not to be their fortune. Mr. Nickerson helped his friend into the vehicle, and the driver started at a lively rate for Fifth Avenue.
Orville lived in Seventeenth Street, near Fifth Avenue; Mrs. Marten lived on Fifth Avenue, near Fortieth Street. Thirty-eighth Street and Thirty-ninth Street were reached and passed without further incident than the fact that Orville’s ankle pained him almost beyond the bearing-point; but, as it is not the history of a sprained ankle that I am writing, if the vehicle had stopped at Mrs. Marten’s my pen would not have been set to paper.
But the motor-wagon did not even pause. It kept on as if the Harlem River were to be its next stop.
Orville had stated the number of his destination with distinctness, and he now rang the annunciator and asked the driver why he did not stop.
Calmly, in the even tones that clear-headed persons use when they wish to inspire confidence, the chauffeur said: “Don’t be alarmed, sir, but I can’t stop. There’s something out of kilter, and I may have to run some time before I can get the hang of it. There’s no danger as long as I can steer.”
“Can’t you slacken up in front of the house, so that I can jump?”
“With that foot, sir? Impossible, and, anyway, I can’t slacken up. I think we’ll stop soon. I don’t know when it was charged, but a gentleman had it before I was sent out with it. It won’t be long, I think. I’ll run around the block, and maybe I can stop the next time.”
Orville groaned for a twofold reason: his ankle was jumping with pain, and he would lose the pleasure of taking Miss Badeau in to dinner, for it was a minute past seven.