The little man danced about on his toes, while his wife swung back and forth until her bracelets and bangles tinkled in delight.
Burk was now at the front of the car. He pulled back the emergency brake lever, and Jake felt the strange vehicle starting to roll farther down into the ditch. He put all his strength against the tailboard; the little dark man was at his side. “Poosh—that’s right!” The boy heaved, his face red with exertion; Burk had gripped the spokes of the wheel in the ditch, and was bending all his effort to force the car from its lodgment. The united strength of the three of them slowly shoved the strange little vehicle up the slanting grade, and in half a minute the car was back on the road again, headed toward Wallistown, no worse for its plunge.
“Many, many thanks—many!” the dark man cried happily. He clapped his villainous-looking hat on his head, and scrambling into the seat, worked the levers and steering-wheel back and forth to see that no damage had been done. “You help fine! Come up, Maria!”
“Yes, you help fine!” the little man repeated. “Now we go. You go, too?”
“We’re going the same way you are,” said Jake quickly. “You—you couldn’t give us a lift, could you?”
“For sure! For sure!” Their new acquaintance was all smiles. “You help me fine! I help you a little bit maybe.”
They needed no second invitation and darted around to the tiny set of steps that hung from the tailboard, sprang one after the other through the slit in the canvas at the back, and tumbled into the body of the caravan. An alarming pop-popping sounded in front; the wheels began to move, and the car rattled down the highway at the breath-taking speed of twenty miles an hour.
Jake looked around the interior of the strange van. Overhead arched the canvas roof, filtering the sunshine and splashed with moving shadows as the car journeyed down the road. He found himself sitting on the edge of a bunk built across the floor of the car, directly back of the driver’s seat now occupied by the ridiculous couple whom they had helped. In one corner was a small charcoal stove. The interior was heaped with all sorts of things: a little tin trunk, cooking pots, a cage with a canary chirping inside, bundles of clothing; from hooks swung more clothing, a lantern, a jangling bucket, a spare tire. “A regular house on wheels!” he told himself. “Wonder if these people are sure-enough gypsies?”