Her age appeared to be about twenty. Her face was pale,
as was natural under the circumstances, but it lighted up with a
friendly and grateful smile as the party, entered.
She extended her hand to the boys in turn, as Mrs. Sterling
introduced them.
"You must excuse my not rising," she said, "but I've had a rather
nerve-racking experience, as no one knows better than yourselves.
I want to thank you with all my heart for the way you came to my
help when I was unable to help myself."
"Oh, you make too much of it, Miss Berwick," Bob replied, and Joe
assented with a nod of his head. "We just had the good luck to be
close at hand, and if we hadn't done it, somebody else would."
"That doesn't change the fact that you did it," replied the girl.
"And you took a chance of losing your lives. The gasoline tank might
have exploded and killed us all."
"We're mighty glad that you came out of it as well as you did,"
said Bob warmly.
"It's almost a miracle that you weren't killed," added Joe.
"I suppose I deserve a severe scolding for having caused all this
excitement and damage," was the response. "I don't know what on earth
caused the accident. There seemed to be something the matter with
the steering gear. Then I got excited and dizzy and tried to stop
the machine. What I think happened was that I put my foot on the
accelerator when I meant to put it on the brake.
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