e to protect the driver from the front, the wind shield
first having been turned down out of the way.

"Now let the rain come," chuckled Jane, after having taken a quick
survey of their work.

"Yes; it is nice and cosy in here," answered Miss Elting. "I almost
believe I should like to sleep in here during a rainstorm."

"Excuthe me," objected Tommy. "I'd be thure to get crampth in my
neck."

"She would that," answered Jane laughingly, starting the car and a
moment later throwing in the high-speed clutch.

The party was not more than fairly started on the way again when the
raindrops began pattering on the leather top of the car.

"There it comes," cried Jane McCarthy. "Sounds like rain on a tin
roof, doesn't it?"

The downpour rapidly grew heavier, accompanied by lightning and
thunder. The flashes were blinding, dazzling Jane's eyes so that she
had difficulty in keeping her car in the road. It was now nearly
evening, and an early darkness had already settled over the landscape.
There was little hope of more light, for night would be upon them by
the time the storm had passed. True, there would be a moon behind the
clouds, but the latter bade fair to be wholly obscured during the
evening.

Despite the blinding storm that masked the road, and the sharp flashes
of lightning that dazzled the eyes of the driver, Crazy Jane McCarthy
went on driving ahead at the same rate of speed until Miss Elting
begged her to go more slowly. Jane reduced the speed of the car,
though so slightly as to be scarcely noticeable.

The guardian smiled but made no further comment. Being shut in as they
were, they would have difficulty in getting out were an accident to
befall them. All at once, however, Jane slowed down with a jolt. She
then sent the car cautiously ahead, this time driving out on a level
grass plot at the side of the road. There she shut down, turned off
the power, and, leaning back, yawned audibly.

"Whoa!" she said wearily.

"Why, Jane, what is the matter?" cried Miss Elting.

"Like a sailboat, we can't make much headway without wind. As it
happens, we have no wind on the quarter, as the sailors would say."

"I don't understand."

"She means the tires are down," explained Harriet Burrell.

"Yes. I told Dad those rear tires were leaking, but he declared they
were good for five hundred miles yet."

"Can't we patch them?" queried Harriet.

"We can," replied Jane, "but we aren't going to until this rain lets
up