Richard obeyed her instinct and his. Everything pointed to the probability that Simon Lock, anticipating pursuit, had laid a trap at the Old Sugar-Loaf to divert such pursuit. Then Raphael Craig must surely have been drugged, or he would have protested to the ostler.
Before they had got quite clear of the last houses of Dunstable they picked up Mr. Craig’s gold watch, which lay battered in their track. If Craig had been drugged he must have quickly recovered! Teresa was now extremely excited, anxious, and nervous. Previously she had talked, but she fell into silence, and there was no sound save the monotonous, rather high-pitched drone of the motor-car. They passed through Markyate, four miles, and through Redbourne, another four miles, in quick succession. The road lies absolutely straight, and the gradients are few and easy.
‘Surely,’ said Teresa at length, ‘if they are on this road we should soon overtake them at this speed?’
‘Fifty miles an hour,’ he said.
They were descending the last part of the hill half-way down which lies Redbourne. It was a terrible, perilous speed for night travelling, but happily the night was far from being quite dark. Though there was no moon, there were innumerable multitudes of stars, and the dusty road showed white and clear.
‘Some cars can do up to seventy an hour. And if Simon Lock got a car he would be certain to get the best.’
As he spoke they both simultaneously descried a moving light at the bottom of the hill. In a few seconds the car was within a hundred yards of the light, and they could see the forms of men moving and hear voices.
‘It is the other car broken down,’ exclaimed Teresa. ‘Put out our lights, quick!’
Richard realized in a flash that he ought to have taken that simple precaution before, and to have approached with every circumspection. The men in front had perceived the second car, and Richard’s extinction of his lights came too late. He heard a sharp word of command, and then three men left the disabled car and ran in a body to the other one. Their forms were distinctly visible.
‘Three to one!’ Richard said softly. ‘It looks like being a bit stiff.’