He had his car waiting at the foot of the drive, and just as I got in we heard it thunder. "How far is it to your mother's?" "Twelve miles." "It's going to rain." "Rain or not, I'm not going back, Roger," I said. "Imagine Bill's getting that letter for nothing." He got into the car and it began to rain at once. Everyone knows about that storm now. We had gone about four miles when the sky fairly opened. The water beat in under the top and washed about our feet. We drove up to the hubs in water, and the lights, instead of showing us the way, only lit up a wall of water ahead. It was like riding into Niagara Falls. We were pretty sick, I can tell you. "Why didn't you look at the sky?" I yelled at Roger, above the beating of the storm. "Bill can always tell when it's going to storm." "Oh, damn Bill!" said Roger, and the car slid off the road and into a gully. Roger just sat still and clutched the wheel. "Aren't you going to do something?" I snapped. "I'm not going to sit here all night and be drowned." "Is there anything you could suggest?" "Can't you get out and push it?" "I cannot." But after five minutes or so he did crawl out, and by tying my suitcase straps round one of the wheels he got the car back into the road. I daresay I was a trifle pettish by that time. "I wish you wouldn't drip on me," I said. "I beg your pardon," he replied, and moved as far from me as he could. We went on in silence. At last: "There's one comfort about getting that soaking," he said: "it's washed that damned perfume off." There's one thing about Bill, he keeps his temper. And he doesn't raise the roof when he gets his clothes wet. He rather likes getting into difficulties, to show how well he can get out of them. But Roger is like a cat. He always hated to get his feet wet. "If you had kept the car in the centre of the road you wouldn't have had to get out," I said shortly. "Oh, well, if you're going back to first causes," he retorted, "if you'd never suggested this idiotic thing I wouldn't be laying up a case of lumbago at this minute." "Lumbago is middle-aged, isn't it?" "We're neither of us as young as we were a few years ago." That was inexcusable. Roger is at least six years older than I am. Besides, even if it were true, there was no necessity for him to say it. But there was no time to quarrel, for at that moment we were going across a bridge over a small stream. It was a river now. The first thing I knew was that the car shook and rocked and there was a dull groaning underneath. The next minute we had gone slowly down about four feet and the creek was flowing over us. We said nothing at first. The lights went off almost immediately, as the engine drowned, and there we sat in the flood, and the first thing I knew I was crying. "The bridge is broken," said Roger, above the rush of the stream. "I didn't think you were washing the car," I whimpered. "We'll be drowned, that's all."