Hanging to the wheel, Matt threw himself over the upright levers, dropped into the driver’s seat, disengaged the clutch and jammed both brakes home. Even then he was in doubt as to whether he would succeed in stopping the car. If it continued mysteriously to refuse control, there was certain destruction for both Matt and the car against the side of the train, the box cars of which were already flashing over the crossing. But the car stopped--stopped within a yard of the rushing box cars! Matt dared not throw in the reverse, fearing the machine might move forward instead of backward, so he dropped into the road and lay there, panting and exhausted, while the freight rolled on. CHAPTER IV. THE MANILA ENVELOPE. “Sufferin’ doom! I’m beginning to think Billy had a bean on the right number, pard, when he said this car would have to kill somebody before it settled down and acted as though it was civilized.” Matt looked up and saw his cowboy chum. McGlory was rubbing a bruise on the side of his face and was carrying the long manila envelope in his hand. “Why didn’t you let the car go to blazes?” demanded the cowboy. “What did you want to hang on to it for? The best place for the blamed thing is the junk pile.” “I couldn’t let go without getting run over,” explained Matt, rising to his feet. “Well, you’d feel a heap more comfortable under a pneumatic tire than you would under a train of box cars!” McGlory’s face was white, and his voice trembled. The strain he had been under was just beginning to tell on him. “The owner of the runabout,” he went on, “showed his good sense when he cut loose from it. The car’s like a broncho, Matt, and you never can tell when its fiendishness is going to break loose. If we had a keg of powder, I’m a Piegan if I wouldn’t scatter that sizz wagon all over this part of Long Island.” McGlory glared savagely at the white, innocent-looking machine. The freight train had passed, and Matt was leaning against the car and cudgeling his brains to think of some reason for the runabout’s acting as it did. “It brought us out of Krug’s Corner as nice as you please,” he mused. “Which is just the way it took us into Krug’s Corner,” proceeded the cowboy. “That’s the way the pesky thing works. First it lulls you into thinking it wouldn’t side-step, or buck-jump, or do anything else that was crooked or underhand for the world; then, when you think you’re all right, the runabout hauls off and hands you one. That’s the meanest kind of treachery--reaching out the glad hand only to land on you with a bunch of fives. There’s something human about that car, Matt.” “Inhuman, I should say,” muttered Matt. “Well, it’s too much for me. Get in, Joe, and we’ll cross the track to those trees over there and rest up a little before we go on to the Malvern Country Club.” “Damaged much, pard?” “Jolted some, that’s all.”