Right ahead lay the spot where the road terminated in a long wharf, at which occasional steamers landed. Every second brought them closer to it. If Rob could not stop the machine before it reached the end of the wharf, it was bound to plunge over and into the sea. All this flashed through the boy’s mind as he strove to find some means of stopping the car. But the auto was of a type unfamiliar to him. One experiment in checking its motion resulted instead in a still more furious burst of speed.
Like objects seen in a nightmare, the stores, the white faces of the alarmed townsfolk, and the other familiar objects of the village street, streaked by in a gray blur.
“I must stop it! I must!” breathed Rob.
But how? Where had the manufacturer of the car concealed his emergency brake? The lever controlling it seemed to be mysteriously out of sight. Suddenly the motion of the car changed. It no longer bumped. It ran terribly smoothly and swiftly.
From the street it had passed out upon the even surface of the planked wharf. Only a few seconds now in which to gain control of it!
“The emergency brake!” shouted Rob aloud in his extremity.
“Your foot! It works with your foot, I think!”
The voice, faint as a whisper over a long-distance telephone, came to the ears of the striving boy. It belonged to the girl beside him. Glancing down, Rob now saw what he would have observed at first, if he had had time to look about him—a metal pedal projected through the floor of the car. With an inward prayer, he jammed his foot down upon it. Would it work?
The end of the pier was terribly close now. The water gleamed blue and intense. It seemed awaiting the fatal plunge overboard.
But that plunge was not taken. There was a grinding sound, like a harsh purr, the speed of the car decreased, and, finally, it came to a stop—just in time.