All but Jack. He kept his eyes on the still-heaving asphalt, and
chewed gum and grinned while he drove, with the persistent sensation
that he was driving a hydro-aeroplane across a heaving ocean. Still,
he knew what the fellows were up to, and he was perfectly willing to
let them have all the fun they wanted, so long as they didn't
interfere with his driving.

In the back of his mind was a large, looming sense of responsibility
for the car. It was his mother's car, and it was new and shiny, and
his mother liked to drive flocks of fluttery, middle-aged ladies to
benefit teas and the like. It had taken a full hour of coaxing to get
the car for the day, and Jack knew what would be the penalty if
anything happened to mar its costly beauty. A scratch would be almost
as much as his life was worth. He hoped dazedly that the fellows would
keep their feet off the cushions, and that they would refrain from
kicking the back seat.

Mrs. Singleton Corey was a large, firm woman who wore her white hair
in a marcelled pompadour, and frequently managed to have a flattering
picture of herself in the Sunday papers--on the
Society-and-Club-Doings page, of course. She figured prominently in
civic betterment movements, and was loud in her denunciation of Sunday
dances and cabarets and the frivolities of Venice and lesser beach
resorts. She did a lot of worrying over immodest bathing suits, and
never went near the beach except as a member of a purity committee, to
see how awfully young girls behaved in those public places.

She let Jack have the car only because she believed that he was going
to take a party of young Christian Endeavorers up Mount Wilson to view
the city after dark. She could readily apprehend that such a sight