Helen blew the horn, once, twice and again.
"No, really, dear, I wouldn't," continued Mary. "Of course you know he's a terrible flirt. Why he can't even leave the girls at the office alone."
Quite unconsciously Helen adopted the immemorial formula.
"Burdon Woodward has always acted to me like a perfect gentleman," said she.
"Of course he has, dear. If he hadn't, I know you wouldn't have gone out with him last night, for instance. But he has such a reckless, headstrong way with him. Suppose last night, instead of coming home, he had turned the car toward Boston or New York, what would you have done then?"
"Don't worry. I could have stopped him."
"Stopped him? How could you, if he were driving very fast?"
"Oh, it's easy enough to stop a car," said Helen. "One of the girls at school showed me." Leaning over, she ran her free hand under the instrument board.
"Feel these wires back of the switch," she said. "All you have to do is to reach under quick and pull one loose—just a little tug like this—and you can stop the wildest man, and the wildest car on earth…. See?"
In the excitement of her demonstration she tugged the wire too hard. It came loose in her hand and the engine stopped as though by magic.