“Well, we’ll help you get on the shoe.”
Matt and Billy worked. McGlory stood near, watching and talking with the owner of the car.
After the tire had been repaired, Matt looked over the runabout critically. Much to his amazement, he could find nothing wrong.
“It’s the double hoodoo,” whispered Billy; “that’s all that’s the trouble.”
“Much obliged to you,” said the man, cranking up. “Now we’ll see how she acts.”
He got in, went through the operations for a fresh start, but the runabout began backing. While the man shouted, and said things, the runabout backed in a circle around the big touring car, then dropped rearward down a shallow embankment at the roadside—and its passenger had another spill, out over the rear deck this time. For a second, he stood on his head and shoulders, then turned clear over and made a quick move sideways in getting to his feet. He was afraid, evidently, that the runabout was coming on top of him. But the car, almost in defiance of the laws of gravitation, hung to the side of the steep bank, its position nearly perpendicular.
“Speak to me about that!” gasped McGlory.
Matt was scared. From the top of the bank he stood staring while the man got out of the way.
“Are you all right?” Matt asked.
“No thanks to that fiendish machine if I am,” sputtered the man, laboring frantically up the slope. “It has tried to kill me in a dozen different ways since I left home with it. I’m done. Life’s too short to bother with such an infernal car as that.”