"At last I returned to the car. Alas, it was still there. I then had recourse to what is known as 'the process of exhaustion.' In fact, I found it extremely useful. By means of that process I was eventually successful in starting the engine, and, in the same elementary way, I got into top gear. I drew out of that yard with a running backfire nearly blowing me out of my seat.
"Well, the general idea was to find a garage. The special one was to hear what people said when I stopped to ask them the way. The fourth one I asked was a chauffeur. Under his direction, one first of all reduced the blinding stammer of the exhaust to an impressive but respectable roar, and then proceeded in his company to a dairy, a garage, another dairy and a hotel—in that order. I gave that chap a skinful and fifty francs….
"Yesterday I drove home. I can prove it. All through the trams, like a two-year-old. I admit I took over six hours, but I lunched on the way. I trust that two of the poultry I met are now in Paradise. Indeed, I see no reason to suspect the contrary. So far as I could observe, they looked good, upright fowls. And I look forward confidently to an opportunity of apologising to them for their untimely translation. They were running it rather fine, and out of pure courtesy I set my foot positively upon the brake. Unfortunately, it wasn't the brake, but the accelerator…. My recollection of the next forty seconds is more than hazy. There is, so to speak, a hiatus in my memory—some two miles long. This was partly due to the force with which the back of the front seat hit me in the small of the back. Talk about a blue streak…. Oh, it's a marvellous machine—very quick in the uptake. Give her an inch, and she'll take a hell of a lot of stopping. However…."
"Have you seen Roland?" I said.
"Yes. He dined last night. I told him you'd broken down his beauty and that I had administered the coup de grâce. He quite believed it."
"What did he say?" said Adèle.
"Since you ask me," said Berry, "I'll give you his very words. I think you'll value them. 'I tell you,' he said, 'I am very proud. You say she is done. Well, then, there are other cars in the usine. But she has saved something which no one can buy in the world—the light in a lady's eyes.'"
There are things in France, besides sunshine, which are not for sale.