It ran like the wind. Down the quiet, vacant streets of Detroit, in the gray chill of early morning, they raced at a speed that made the houses on either side blur into a gray haze. Coffee Jim clung breathlessly to the mechanic's seat, while Ford bent over the steering lever and gave her more power, and still more power. "Holy Moses, she sure does run!" Coffee Jim gasped, when the car slowed down smoothly and stopped. "You'll win that race sure as shooting." "Yes, she's a good little car," Ford said, looking it over critically. "She's a pretty good little car." He stood looking at it, his hands in his pockets. "I've got an idea for a four-cylinder motor that will beat her, though," he said. "It's too late to build it now; we'll have to put this one in the race. But I'll make a car yet that'll beat this as much as this beats a bicycle." It was not a boast; it was a simple statement of fact. The little racer was finished, thoroughly well done; he spent no more thought on it. Already his mind was reaching ahead, planning a better one. It may be imagined with what anxiety the Fords awaited the day of the races. Ford was to be his own driver, and Mrs. Ford's dread of losing the race was mixed with fear for his safety if there should be an accident. She had seen the car in the tryout, and its speed terrified her, though Ford assured her, with masculine clumsiness, that even greater speed had been made in previous races. Alexander Winton of Cleveland, then the track champion of the country, had beaten it more than once. On the racetrack, Ford said, he was confident he could do better. Later there was a quiet tryout on the racetrack that showed Ford he was right, though he kept secret the exact time he had made. On the day of the races enormous crowds gathered at the Grosse Point tracks. It was the first automobile track meeting ever held in Michigan, and excitement ran high. Alexander Winton was there, confident and smiling in his car, which had broken so many records. The crowds cheered him wildly. Ford, quiet and perhaps a little white with the tension, drove his car out on the tracks, was greeted with a few uncertain cheers. "Who's that?" people said. "Oh, that's a Detroit man--let's see, what is his name? Ford--never heard of him before. Funny little car, isn't it?" "Maybe he's been put in to fill out. He's the only man against Winton in the free-for-all. They couldn't get a real car to race Winton." "Hi, there's Cooper! Cooper! Rah!" The crowd got to its feet and cheered Tom Cooper, the bicycle champion, who strolled on to the field and chatted with Winton. Ford was outside it all. He had been too busy working on his car, had had too little money, to be on intimate terms with the big men of the automobile business, or to become friendly with champions.