Joe’s brain worked like lightning. There was but one chance. He swung the wheel around, the car crashed through a fence at the side of the road, suddenly stopped short, and Joe and Jim were sent headlong into the river!
[CHAPTER II]
A SURPRISE
The water was icy and deep, and at this point the current was swift. The force with which the luckless occupants of the car had been propelled sent them far beneath the surface and some distance out into the stream.
A moment later their heads appeared above the water, and they struck out for the shore. Both were strong swimmers, and in a few strokes they reached the bank. Fortunately they had escaped striking any part of the car in their wild hurtling through space, and apart from the chill and wetting were unharmed.
From the mud at the river’s edge, they dragged their dripping feet to the solid ground of the road. Then they stood still and looked at each other. The shock and suddenness of it all still affected them, but as they continued to look at the comical figure that each presented, with hair plastered over their faces and clothes clinging to their bodies, their sense of the ludicrous got the better of them and they burst into laughter.
“Talk about scarecrows!” gurgled Jim, as he dragged a wet handkerchief from his pocket and mopped his face in a vain attempt to dry it.
“None of them have anything on us,” admitted Joe, as he threw off his coat and wrung one dripping trousers leg after the other.