From Everybody's Magazine
He was a meek little man with sagging frame, dim lamps and feeble ignition. Anxiously he pressed the salesman to tell him which of us used cars in the wareroom was the slowest and safest.
The salesman laid his hand upon me and declared soberly: "You can't possibly go wrong on this one, Mr. Todd." To a red-haired boy he called, "Willie, drive Mr. Todd out for a lesson."
We ran to the park and stopped beside a lawn. "Take the wheel," said
Willie.
Mr. Todd demurred. "Let me watch you awhile," he pleaded. "You see, I'm new at this sort of thing. In mechanical matters I am helpless. I might run somebody down or crash into a tree. I—I don't feel quite up to it to-day, so just let me ride around with you and get used to the—the motion, as it were."
"All you need is nerve," Willie replied. "The quickest way for you to get nerve is to grab hold here and, as it were, drive."
"Driving, they say, does give a man self-confidence," our passenger observed tremulously. "Quite recently I saw an illustration of it. I saw an automobilist slap his wife's face while traveling thirty miles an hour."
"They will get careless," said Willie.
Mr. Todd clasped the wheel with quivering hands and braced himself for the ordeal.
"Set her in low till her speed's up," Willie directed. "Then wiggle her into high."