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I threw off my evening clothes, and putting on a rough suit, an overcoat, and motor-cap, went down the back staircase and along to the garage, where, amid the coming and going of the cars of departing guests, I was able to run out without being noticed.
"I've got it!" he exclaimed in a low voice as he took out a big coat, motor-cap, and goggles. "Quick work, wasn't it?" "Excellent!" declared the Count, and then, bending to me, he added, "Round there to the left. The high road is a little farther on to Marseilles!" "To Marseilles?"
Jim asked where the nearest telephone was, and learned that it was half a mile away at a farm-house. Jim turned up his collar, pulled down his motor-cap, and struck out along the muddy road. He startled the farmer's family and their large hands were not wide enough to hide their wider smiles. On the long hike thither Jim had worked out his stratagem.
Evidently as far away as half a block, for at that distance his motor-cap was suddenly pulled off, and it was with bared head that he passed her. At the moment the car was certainly not running as fast as it had been doing twenty rods back; it went by at a pace moderate enough to show the pair to each other with distinctness.
Then, in motor-cap and champagne-coloured dust-veil, Gabrielle mounted at the wheel, with the young fellow at her side and Stokes in the back, and drove away down the long avenue to the high-road. The car was her delight. Never so happy was she as when, wrapped in her leather-lined motor-coat, she drove the "sixteen."
Mention of her name recalled, under that white Italian moonlight, a vision of her the tall, slim, graceful girlish figure, the oval delicate face with clear blue eyes, and the wealth of red-gold hair beneath her motor-cap.
But a moment later explanation offered itself, though it seemed as far-fetched as the original impression. My mind, being logical, was obliged to provide something, apparently. For Mrs. Franklyn, while dressed to go out, with thick walking-boots, a pointed stick, and a motor-cap tied on with a veil as for the windy lanes, was obviously content to go no farther than the little garden paths.
But I was as helpless as a person in a nightmare; and, indeed, it was as unreal and dreadful to me as a nightmare to see that fat, fur-coated figure walking toward me, with the bearded face of Monsieur Charretier showing between turned-up collar and motor-cap surmounted by lifted goggles. They say you have time to think of everything while you are drowning.
Few persons cared to disturb them, even by a greeting, as they sat side by side in the corridor or walked together down the long gallery. Jane Erskine had put off that air, which suited her so admirably, of seeming to be always under an open sky; she had left it behind with her short skirt and the motor-cap which she loved to pull down over her eyes.
I purposely did not wear my motor-cap, but my pockets were stuffed with all my belongings that were portable. "Hulloa!" he cried cheerily. "What are you doing to-day eh?" "Well," I said, with apparent indifference, "I'm just going to look round the car before breakfast. Perhaps I'll go for a run later on. The roads are still in perfect condition." "Then I'll go with you," was his prompt reply.
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