e was
angry.

"Idiot! Ought to have put on my rubbers. Well--too late now," she
observed, as she started the engine.

She again followed the swastika tread. To avoid a hole in the road
ahead, the unknown driver had swung over to the side of the road, and
taken to the intensely black earth of the edge of an unfenced cornfield.
Flashing at Claire came the sight of a deep, water-filled hole,
scattered straw and brush, debris of a battlefield, which made her
gaspingly realize that her swastikaed leader had been stuck and--

And instantly her own car was stuck.

She had had to put the car at that hole. It dropped, far down, and it
stayed down. The engine stalled. She started it, but the back wheels
spun merrily round and round, without traction. She did not make one
inch. When she again killed the blatting motor, she let it stay dead.
She peered at her father.

He was not a father, just now, but a passenger trying not to irritate
the driver. He smiled in a waxy way, and said, "Hard luck! Well, you did
the best you could. The other hole, there in the road, would have been
just as bad. You're a fine driver, dolly."

Her smile was warm and real. "No. I'm a fool. You told me to put on
chains. I didn't. I deserve it."

"Well, anyway, most men would be cussing. You acquire merit by not
beating me. I believe that's done, in moments like this. If you'd like,
I'll get out and crawl around in the mud, and play turtle for you."

"No. I'm quite all right. I did feel frightfully strong-minded as long
as there was any use of it. It kept me going. But now I might just as
well be cheerful, because we're stuck, and we're probably going to stay
stuck for the rest of this care-free summer day."

The weariness of the long strain caught her, all at once. She slipped
forward, sat huddled, her knees crossed under the edge of the steering
wheel, her hands falling beside her, one of them making a faint brushing
sound as it slid down the upholstery. Her eyes closed; as her head
drooped farther, she fancied she could hear the vertebrae click in her
tense neck.

Her father was silent, a misty figure in a lap-robe. The rain streaked
the mica lights in the side-curtains. A distant train whistled
desolately across the sodden fields. The inside of the car smelled
musty. The quiet was like a blanket over the ears. Claire was in a hazy
drowse. She felt that she could never drive again.

CHAPTER II

CLAIRE ESCAPES FROM RESPECTABILITY