“We ought to be able to get away from them here!” cried Jerry, turning on more gasolene and increasing the current from the batteries. The auto seemed to jump forward.
“Look out! Stop!” yelled Nestor, seizing Jerry by the arm.
“We can’t! We’ll be killed if we do!” shouted the boy, thinking the miner had lost his head through fear.
“And we’ll be dashed to death if we keep on! We’re running straight for a precipice three hundred feet high! Shut down the machine or we’ll go over the cliff!”
With a yank at the levers, Jerry turned off the power and put on the brakes. And it was only just in time, for, not one hundred feet ahead, the prairie came to an abrupt end, terminating in a sheer bluff, over which the auto and those in it would have been dashed had not the miner’s practiced eye told him what to expect. He recognized the conformation of the land and knew what was coming.
The adventurers were now between two dangers. They could not go on because of the precipice, and their escape to the rear was cut off by the maddened steers that now were but a quarter of a mile away, thundering on fiercely. To turn to the left or right was impossible, as the line of cattle was a curving one, like a pair of horns, and to go to either side meant to run straight into the midst of the beasts.
“Let’s get out of the machine and shoot as many as we can!” cried Ned, drawing his revolver. “Maybe we can scare them away!”
“Don’t think of it!” exclaimed Nestor. “Cattle are used to seeing men only on horseback or in wagons. Once on the ground we’d be trampled under foot in an instant. Our only hope is to stay in the machine. It will protect us somewhat when they rush over us.”
“Shall we shoot?” asked Jerry.
“Our only chance is to turn them to one side, and shooting at them may do it,” replied the miner. “Get ready and we’ll all fire at once.”