"I did. Simply because there's nobody else to speak to. Don't happen to know anything about motor-cars, do you?" It was all very icily enunciated, but had no noticeably freezing effect upon the man's mood. "I sure do," he told her cheerfully. "Know 'em from front bumper to tail-lamp. Yours is a Boyd-Merril, Twin Eight, this year's model. Fox-Whiting starting and lighting system. Great little car, too, if you ask me." "What I was going to ask you," came the cool little voice, more haughtily than ever, "was not what you think of the car but if you--if you happened to know how to make the miserable thing go." "Sure," he replied to the back of her head, with all of his former pleasant manner. "Pull out the ignition button; push down the starter pedal with your right foot; throw out the clutch with your left; put her into low; let in your clutch slowly; give her a little----" "Smarty!" He had counted upon some such interruption, and chuckled when it came. "I know all that." "Then why don't you do it?" he queried innocently. "You're right square in my way, the road's narrow, and I've got to be moving on." "I don't do it," she informed that portion of the world which lay immediately in front of her slightly elevated nose, "because it won't work. I pulled out the ignition button and--and nothing happened. Then I tried to force down the starter pedal and the crazy thing won't go down." "I see," said Packard interestedly. "Don't know a whole lot about cars, do you?" "The world wasn't made overnight," she said tartly. "I've had this pesky thing a month. Do you know what's the matter?" He took his time in replying. He was so long about it, in fact, that Miss Blue Cloak stirred uneasily and finally shot him a questioning look over her shoulder, just to make sure, he suspected, that he hadn't slipped away and left her. "Well?" she asked again. "Speak to me?" he repeated himself, pretending to start from a deep abstraction. "Oh, do I know what's the matter? Sure!" She waited a reasonable length of time for him to go on. He, secure in the sense of his own mastery of the situation, waited for her. Between them they allowed it to grow very quiet there in the wood by the lake shore. He saw her glance furtively at the lowering sun. "If you do know," she said finally and somewhat faintly, but as frigidly as ever, "will you tell me or won't you?" "Why," he said, as though he had not thought of it, "I don't know. If I were really sure that I was needed. You know it's mighty hard telling these days when you stumble upon a damsel in distress whether a stranger's aid is welcome or not. If there's one thing I won't do it's shove myself forward when I'm not wanted." "You're a nasty animal!" she cried hotly. "For all I know," he resumed in an untroubled tone, "the end of your journey may be just around the bend, about a hundred yards off. And if I plunged in to be of assistance I might be suspected of being a fresh guy."