The Love Bug co-drivers) limps home last with Herbie missing two wheels and having to use a wagon wheel to get to the finish line. Despite Tennessee's best efforts, it looks as if Herbie will be unable to start the return leg of the race the following morning. Thorndyke then arrives and claims that this makes him the new owner of the car. Wu regretfully tells Jim of the wager and that in accordance with its terms this is true. Thorndyke, thinking he is Herbie's new owner, gloats to Jim about what he is going to do to Herbie and kicks Herbie's front
The Gold-Bug the main characters are searching for treasure, and he asks them if they have been reading Edgar Allan Poe. The title of Richard Powers' 1991 novel "The Gold Bug Variations" is derived from "The Gold-Bug" and from Bach's composition "Goldberg Variations", and the novel incorporates part of the short story's plot. Jewish Russian author David Shrayer-Petrov published "The House of Edgar Allan Poe" in "2011 Prose", with "The Gold-Bug" serving as a major influence. Shrayer-Petrov includes a beetle, also tied to a string, which finds treasure in the basement of the house of Sarah Helen Whitman, Poe's love interest who