The Lightning Conductor: The Strange Adventures of a Motor-Car

								


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  THE
LIGHTNING CONDUCTOR


THE STRANGE ADVENTURES OF A MOTOR-CAR


EDITED BY
C. N. AND A. M. WILLIAMSON


REVISED AND ENLARGED


FIFTEENTH IMPRESSION


NEW YORK
HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY
1903

  Copyright, 1903,
BY
HENRY HOLT & CO.


ROBERT DRUMMOND, PRINTER, NEW YORK.

TO THE REAL MONTIE

THE LIGHTNING CONDUCTOR

MOLLY RANDOLPH TO HER FATHER

                               In the Oak Room, the "White Lion,"

                                        Cobham, Surrey, November 12.


Dear Shiny-headed Angel,
I hope you won't mind, but I've changed all my plans. I've bought an
automobile, or a motor-car, as they call it over here; and while I'm
writing to you, Aunt Mary is having nervous prostration on a sofa in a
corner at least a hundred years old--I mean the sofa, not the corner,
which is a good deal more. But perhaps I'd better explain.
Well, to begin with, some people we met on the steamer (they were an
archdeacon, with charming silk legs, and an archdeaconess who snubbed us
till it leaked out through that Aunt Mary that you were the Chauncey
Randolph) said if we wanted to see a thoroughly characteristic English
village, we ought to run out to Cobham; and we ran--to-day.
Aunt Mary had one of her presentiments against the expedition, so I was
sure it would turn out nice. When we drove up to this lovely old
red-brick hotel, in a thing they call a fly because it crawls; there
were several automobiles starting off, and I can tell you I felt
small--just as if I were Miss Noah getting out the ark. (Were there any
Miss Noahs, by the way?)
One of the automobiles was different from any I've ever seen on our side
or this. It was high and dignified, like a chariot, and looked over the
heads of the others as the archdeaconess used to look over mine till she
heard whose daughter I was. A chauffeur was sitting on the front seat,
and a gorgeous man had jumped down and was giving him directions. He
wasn't looking my way, so I seized the opportunity to snapshot him, as a
souvenir of English scenery; but that tactless Kodak of mine gave the
loudest "click" you ever heard, and he turned his head in time to
suspect what had been happening. I swept past with my most "haughty Lady
Gwendolen" air, talking to Aunt Mary, and hoped I shouldn't see him
again. But we'd hardly got seated for lunch in a beautiful old room,
panelled from floor to ceiling with ancient oak, when he came into the
room, and Aunt Mary, who has a sneaking weakness for titles (I suppose
it's the effect of the English climate), murmured that there was her
ideal of a duke.
The Gorgeous Man strolled up and took a place at our table. He passed
Aunt Mary some things which she didn't want, and then began to throw out
a few conversational feelers. If you're a girl, and want fun in England,