Dear me, but it's a-goin'!" Aunt Mary exclaimed, as the thing began to
whiz and she felt suddenly impelled to clutch wildly at her flanking
escorts. "Suppose we met a dog."
"We'd leave a floor mat," shrieked Mitchell. "Oh, but isn't this
great--greater--greatest?"
"Time of your life, Aunt Mary!" Jack howled, as they went over a boarded
spot in the pavement, and the old lady nearly went over the back in
consequence. "You're in for the time of your life!"
"How do you like it?" yelled Clover, throwing a glance over his shoulder.
Aunt Mary started to answer, but they came to four car tracks one after
another, and the successive shocks rendered her speechless.
"Where are we going?" Burnett asked.
"Nowhere," said Clover. "Just waking up the machine." And he turned on
another million volts as he spoke.
"Oh, my bonnet!" cried poor Aunt Mary, and that bit of her adornment was
in the street and had been run over four times before they could slow up,
turn around, and get back to the scene of its output.
It speaks volumes for the permeating atmosphere of "having the time of
your life" that its owner laughed when the wreck was shown to her.
"I don't care a bit," she said. "I can go down to Delmonico's an' get me
another to-morrow mornin', easy."
"What a trump you are, Aunt Mary!" said Jack admiringly. "Here, Burnett,
fish her out that extra cap from the cane rack; there's always one in the
bottom. There--now you won't take cold, Aunt Mary."
The cap, with its fore-piece, was the crowning glory of Aunt Mary's
get-up. The brain measurements of him who had bought the cap being to its
present wearer's as five is to three, the effect of its proportions, in
addition to the goggles and the ear-trumpet, was such as to have overawed
a survivor of Medusa's stare.
"Oh, I say," said Mitchell, "it's a sin to keep as good a joke as this in
the family! We must drive her around town until the night falls down or
the battery burns out."
"I say so too," said Burnett. "This is more sport than oiling railroad
tracks and seeing old Tweedwell brought up for it. Say, set her a-buzzing
again. It's a big game, isn't it?"
Clover thought so, with the result that they speeded through tranquil
neighborhoods and churned leisurely where the masses seethed until
countless thousands were wondering what under the sun those four young
fellows had in the back of their car.
The sad part about all good fun is that it has to end sooner or l
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