they had arrived fairly promptly , and the younger firemen were dashing around excitedly , unrolling their hosepipe and flexing their axes ; the older firemen knew at a glance that the building was a dead loss , and were n't even sure that the rain would stop it spreading to neighboring buildings , when a black bentley skidded around the corner and drove up onto the pavement at a speed somewhere in excess of sixty miles per hour , and stopped with a screech of brakes half an inch away from the wall of the bookshop .