Part 43 (1/2)

Staff hardly shared his confidence; still, as far as he could judge, the odds were even. Ismay might beat them to Pennymint Centre by train, and might not. If he did, however, it could not be by more than a slight margin; to balance which fact, Staff had to remind himself that two minutes' margin was all that would be required to get the boat away from land, beyond their reach.

”Look here,” he put it to Iff: ”suppose he does beat us to that boat?”

”Then we'll have to find another.”

”There'll be another handy, all ready for us, I presume?”

”Spare me your sarcasm,” pleaded Iff; ”it is, if you don't mind my mentioning the fact, not your forte. Silence, on the other hand, suits your style cunningly. So shut up and lemme think.”

He relapsed into profound meditations, while the car hummed onwards through the moon-drenched s.p.a.ces of the night.

Presently he roused and, without warning, clambered over the back of the seat into the place beside the chauffeur. For a time the two conferred, heads together, their words indistinguishable in the sweep of air.

Then, in the same spry fas.h.i.+on, the little man returned.

”Spelvin's a treasure,” he announced, settling into his place.

”Why?”

”Knows the country--knows a man in Barmouth who runs a s.h.i.+pyard, owns and hires out motorboats, and all that sort of thing.”

”Where's Barmouth?”

”Four miles this side of Pennymint Point. Now we've got to decide whether to hold on and run our chances of picking up Ismay's boat, or turn off to Barmouth and run our chances of finding chauffeur's friend with boat disengaged. What do you think?”

”Barmouth,” Staff decided after some deliberation but not without misgivings.

”That's what I told Spelvin,” observed Iff. ”It's a gamble either way.”

The city was now well behind them, the car pounding steadily on through Westchester. For a long time neither spoke. The time for talk, indeed, was past--and in the future; for the present they must tune themselves up to action--such action as the furious onrush of the powerful car in some measure typified, easing the impatience in their hearts.

For a time the road held them near railroad tracks. A train hurtled past them, running eastwards: a roaring streak of orange light cras.h.i.+ng through the world of cool night blues and purple-blacks.

The chauffeur swore audibly and let out another notch of speed.

Staff sat spellbound by the amazing romance of it all.... A bare eight days since that afternoon when a whim, born of a love now lifeless, had stirred him out of his solitary, work-a-day life in London, had lifted him out of the ordered security of the centre of the world's civilisation and sent him whirling dizzily across three thousand miles and more to become a partner in this wild, weird ride to the rescue of a damsel in distress and durance vile! Incredible!...

Eight days: and the sun of Alison, that once he had thought to be the light of all the world, had set; while in the evening sky the star of Eleanor was rising and blazing ever more brightly....

Now when a man begins to think about himself and his heart in such poetic imagery, the need for human intercourse grows imperative on his understanding; he must talk or--suffer severely.

Staff turned upon his defenseless companion.

”Iff,” said he, ”when a man's the sort of a man who can fall out of love and in again--with another woman, of course--inside a week--what do you call him?”

”Human,” announced Iff after mature consideration of the problem.

This was unsatisfactory; Staff yearned to be called fickle.

”Human? How's that?” he insisted.