[Illustration: WIG AND I GRABBED THE WHEEL AND TURNED IT AS FAST AS WE
COULD.

_Ray Blakeley's Camp on Wheels._ _Page 97_]

"Bye-bye, Ridgeboro," Wig shouted; "see you later."

By now the car was moving along at a pretty good clip. The store was
'way behind us and we were rolling sweetly down a grade into a kind of
jungle of bushes and tree stumps.

"Good night!" I said; "The plot grows thicker. Where are we at?"

We fell all over each other getting out to the platform, and Wig and I
grabbed the wheel and turned it as fast as we could, tightening up the
chain.

"I thought you said it didn't have any spark in it," I said to Pee-wee.

"I--I _thought_ it didn't," he blurted out; "where are we going?"

"Ask me something easy," I said; "get out of the way. Grab hold of this,
Westy, and pull for all you're worth."

We had the chain tight now and it was only a case of pulling the brakes
tight against the wheels, but, oh, boy, that takes some strength. We
were rolling along an old pair of rails that were buried under grass and
bushes and sometimes we couldn't even see them. It was a regular jungle.
I guess maybe they used to back freight cars down there after lumber.
But it must have been a long time ago, because the stumps were old and
the place was all overgrown. Anyway, that track that we had been left on
was more than just a switch siding, that was sure.

First I didn't mind so much, because things like that are all in the
game, and I thought it would be easy to stop the car. There was hardly
any grade at all where the train had left us, that was sure, but it
doesn't take much of a grade to start things moving on tracks. I guess
that's why they always tighten the brakes when they leave a car. And if
there's one person that knows how to start things, it's Pee-wee. That's
his favorite recreation.

Anyway, now we saw that we were in a pretty bad fix. The grade was good
and steep now and we were moving pretty fast, and no matter how hard we
pulled on the wheel, it didn't seem to make the car slow down. I have to
admit I was getting a little scared. I guess the other fellows were,
too.

"Maybe the thick brush will slow us down," Westy said; "it's awful
thick, ahead."

"Not when we've got a start like this," I told him; "we're just cutting
it all to pieces."

"Maybe one of us could jump off and put a log on the track," Pee-wee
said.

"Yes, and what would happen to the car, and us maybe?" Connie asked him.
"