Carter was about to mount when Carrick put in a solemn appearance from the stables.
"Some one has tackled the automobile with an axe, sir," he announced ruefully. "The wheels are left, and that's about all of the 'go' part." Carter turned wrathfully from the horse to follow Carrick back to the shed where the big car had been housed. With ready sympathy the two young Krovitzers followed.
"It is dastardly," Paul remarked as he bent over and discovered that not a particle of the motive mechanism had been left intact.
"Count on me, sir," Casimir volunteered, "to help you ferret out the rascals. Have you any idea who could have played such a shabby trick?"
While Carter had pretty definite suspicions he was not prepared just then to announce them.
"The car is done for, certainly," he said gloomily. "No," he said as he turned indifferently away, "I don't know who did it, and thank you, Casimir, I don't care to. I don't think I would be justified in killing a man for breaking up even six thousand dollars' worth of property, but if I was certain just now who did it I feel I would be strongly tempted to wring his neck. Au revoir, gentlemen, I am not going to permit this to spoil my ride." With this and a nod, he returned and, mounting the horse, cantered out of view along the road to the castle.
The handsome bay pounded steadily ahead. The air was soothing soft with a thousand scents of forest and hill, of field and farm; kind zephyrs of morning touched his brow and eased his sorrows, while the sun, from a bed of pearl-pink clouds, rose slowly before his eyes. Beyond and alongside of the already striking camp, on the right of the road, the woods began again, leaving the open fields like an alternate square on some mammoth checker board. More than one soldier gazed admiringly at his strong figure as he cantered past, while the sentries, doubtless under instructions, permitted him to pass unchallenged through the lines.
When he reached the spot where he had first seen Trusia—the place of the accident, he checked his horse to indulge in the sensations the scene awakened. He beheld again the marble beauty of the face; he felt the wondrous softness of the skin, and once more his heart was entangled in the meshes of the fragrant hair as the loosened strands blew against his hot cheek.
Round the bend in the road, as then, he heard approaching hoof beats. He marveled that his heart should beat so high merely for the advent of Lady Natalie. In the indulgence of his dream, the suggested thuds presaged the coming of Trusia. He sat immovably upon his horse in mid-road, waiting. Every sense was aquiver, every nerve on edge.
A black horse swept into view as it first had in his fancy. It was ridden by Trusia. Saladin had not forgotten. As his mistress reined him in, his wide eyes shifted about distrustfully. A quiver ran beneath the satiny flanks while his slender legs trembled. Carter made no effort to conceal his surprise, as he lifted his hat in salutation.