"Are you hurt, please? Can we help you?"
The lady started and looked up. Then she put her hand up to her head and pulled her hat straight. She had a very cheerful-looking face and seemed about the age of their mother.
"Thank goodness someone has come by at last! I thought in this benighted country that no one would come to my help! Of course you can help me, little boy, by fetching men from somewhere to right my car and put it into the middle of the road again. If I hadn't smashed or sprained my ankle, I could have walked back to the village and sent someone to bring it along."
"I'll go at once," Chris said cheerfully. "There must be some policemen about, and they'll see to everything."
The lady went into peals of laughter.
"Hark at him! A little Londoner, eh? The police may rescue people in distress in London, but they don't exist in the country, my boy. There's a single one here and there, but my experience is that never by any chance do they turn up when one wants them. You must think of someone better than a policeman. Get to the nearest farm. They'll send some men along."
"There's that farm we passed a little time ago," said Diana. "Run back there, Chris, and ask them to come."
"Of course they may be out in the fields working," said the lady; "but get someone—anyone—quickly, if you can! I seem to have been here hours, and have shouted myself hoarse."
Noel stepped up in front of her when Chris had run off. His eyes were big with thought and anxiety.
"The best person who can help in a naxident is God," he remarked, looking at her gravely; "I fink He's the Person to be asked to send the men you want. For He knows just where they are."