There was an abundance of room, for it was a seven-passenger car, large and roomy.

“This car is a whizzer, I understand,” smiled Mr. Hodges, from the sidewalk.

“It certainly is, sir,” agreed the chauffeur.

“Well, chauffeur, take my friends wherever they want to go to-day, and do whatever they want.  Above all, when you get out on a country road, show ’em some of your high speed.”

“Yes, sir.”

Honk! honk!  The car rolled away, going slowly enough through the city streets.  Jacob Farnum, who sat in front with the driver, lighted a cigar and settled back to enjoy himself.

“Any particular place you want to go, sir?” asked the chauffeur.

“No,” replied the shipbuilder.  “You know the way around this part of the world better than we do.  Take us out into the surrounding country, and show us anything you consider of interest.”

“Yes, sir.”

After a few minutes the car had left Colfax behind.  They were out on the beginning of a country road, now.  The chauffeur let out a few notches of speed.

“Smooth-running car,” commented Mr. Farnum.

“Runs just as smoothly, sir, at sixty miles an hour,” replied the man.

“When we get a little further out, you can us some of that,” smiled Mr. Farnum, contentedly.

“I will, sir.”

“You boys afraid to go at sixty miles an hour?” asked the shipbuilder, turning to face those in the tonneau.

“Scared to death,” laughed Jack Benson, gleefully.

As soon as the chauffeur considered that he had reached a little-enough-traveled part of the country road he let out the speed.

“My, but we’re going some,” called Farnum.

“Fifty miles,” replied the chauffeur.  “Now, I’ll show you sixty.”

The car seemed to leap forward.  Then, it seemed to those in the tonneau as though they were beating any speed ever reached by an express train.

Whizz-zz!  It was wild, exhilarating—­dangerous!

“Say!” gasped Farnum.  “If—­”

That was as far as he got.  The forward end of his side of the car sank to the ground.  The car seemed trying to stand on its head.

Then it stopped, and all in it were hurled into the center of awful disaster.

CHAPTER XIII

THE TRICK IS EASILY SEEN THROUGH

In the next instant all had settled.

There had been a brief moment in which the air around the wrecked auto had seemed full of flying human beings.

Now, they lay by the road side in varying degrees of disaster.

The left front axle had broken, the wheel rolling some yards ere it stopped.

Jacob Farnum, seated right over the axle, was hurled out, head first as nearly as he could afterwards guess.  How he avoided landing on his head and sustaining a broken neck or shattered skull was one of those miraculous things that no one can explain.