‘No! Three to two,’ Teresa corrected him. ‘Here! Take this.’ She handed him a revolver which she had carried under her coat. ‘I just thought of it as I was leaving the house, and took it out of the clock in the drawing-room.’
His appreciation of her thoughtfulness was unspoken, but nevertheless sincere.
The three men were within fifty yards.
‘Slip off behind and into the hedge,’ he ordered. ‘We shall do better from that shelter if there is to be a row.’
She obeyed, and they cowered under the hedge side by side.
‘Get further away from me,’ he said imperatively. ‘You may be in danger just here.’
But she would not move.
‘Whose car is this?’ cried a voice out of the gloom—a rough, bullying voice that Richard did not recognise.
‘Never mind whose car it is!’ Richard sang out. ‘Keep away from it. That’s my advice to you, whoever you are. I can see you perfectly well, and I will shoot the first man that advances another step.’
‘Why?’ returned the same voice. ‘What’s all this bluster for? We only want a bit of indiarubber for a ripped tyre.’