And then the perilous journey began.
With Frank at the wheel, and running the engine only in low gear, as compression against gaining speed, the lieutenant and Joe trotted ahead, one on either side of the road, to indicate the course of the crude highway.
Jerry and Slim, inside the big truck, were doing their best to hold things in place as they rocked and jolted over the deep ruts and gullies.
It must have been this series of terrible jars that finally splashed grease and oil in on the brake bands. Whatever the cause, it suddenly became apparent at one of the steepest and sharpest turns in the whole route that the brakes were not holding.
"Look out!" Frank shouted to Joe and the lieutenant ahead, as he realized the truck was getting beyond his control. "Better jump!" he advised Jerry and Slim, standing just behind him.
As Lieutenant Mackinson and Joe ran to either side of the road, the tractor slid by them at increasing speed. Slim and Jerry, following Frank's bidding, leaped from the rear and landed unharmed in a snow-bank.
"Run her into the side of the mountain," shouted Lieutenant Mackinson, and that was exactly what Frank was doing. It was the only possible way of saving the tractor from gathering more and more momentum, and, finally beyond all control, leaving the road and hurtling down the steep slope.
With all his strength Frank swung the wheel so as to turn the right side of the car at an angle up the mountain wall that flanked the road. In this position the machine was still traveling along with great force when it struck a thick abutting ledge of rock.
There was a sudden jolt, a sharp crack, and Frank was hurtled forward head first into the snow.
When they had brushed him off and made certain that he was uninjured, except for an awful jarring up, they began an examination of the machine.