At that giddy moment, on the very highest spot, I essayed to turn a sharp corner down grade, where a ledge threw us well over to the edge of the curve, and I found my foot brake would not hold. I tried the emergency. It, too, had given way from the constant strain put on it. We were already in “first,” but even so, at that grade our heavy car would coast fifteen or twenty miles an hour. The road ahead switch-backed down, down, down. I calculated we could make two turns safely and that the third would send us spinning over the chasm. I felt my face undergo what novelists call “blanching.” I stiffened, and prepared myself--no time to prepare the others--for the wildest and probably the last drive of my life. And then a weak voice from behind called: “Stop the car, please! I feel ill.” Poor Miss Martha had been suffering all day from a sick headache, but had gallantly admired the scenery between whiles. Now, oblivious to scenery, with closed eyes and wan face, she waited for the dreadful motion to cease. I wanted to, but was in no position to obey her reasonable request. As a drowning man sees everything, to my sharp mental vision of the car spinning over and over toward the final crash, I added a picture of poor Miss Martha, bewildered all the way down, and too ill to do anything but wonder _why_ the car would not stop. I lost fear in a glow of altruistic sympathy. Then, deciding something had to be done quickly, I ran the “old lady’s” nose into a ledge. The left mudguard bent, but we stuck. “The car’s going over!” exclaimed Miss Susan, much surprised. “No, it isn’t,” I said, rather crossly. As well as two paper knees permitted, I got out, and explained about the brakes. Relieved that motion had ceased, Miss Martha sank back blissfully closing her eyes. The others had not realized our danger.