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“Run the fools down!” flared Harley. “What do they think this is? An excursion?”

“We’ll be darned lucky if we get through without killing somebody,” returned Roy grimly. “Did you ever see such a lot of road-hoppers? And the roads alive with traffic! Everything that will run seems to be out, and every fool who can walk! Country’s gone crazy!”

The whole country had gone crazy indeed—crazy with anxiety and morbid curiosity.

The greater part of the population of the North Island seemed to be moving in a mad rush to the earthquake area.

From every town and hamlet in the North Island they came.

From every by-road, swelling the stream of traffic which flowed ever in one direction upon the main highways, came luxurious limousines; tradesmen’s vans; sports cars; lumbering tourers and miniature cars; smart demonstration cars and non-descript, dilapidated vehicles borrowed or resurrected for the occasion; all loaded to capacity and overloaded. A stream of traffic fed by numberless tributaries and flecking the land with moving light from one end to the other.

Here and there a truck, hastily-commissioned and laden with necessities gathered by generous and practical people, held the road steadily and proceeded in conscious virtue, unperturbed by the frantic honkings of impatient holiday-makers who sought to pass.

Motor-cycles, bearing one or more pillion riders, roared past the slower traffic, taking advantage of every opening which offered, speeding around corners and ignoring all traffic regulations, piloted with the audacity which belongs to youth.

Here and there a doctor, accompanied by nurses, drove in silence to the field of new endeavour, where