“My fault that. I told him to come this way because the road’s better. Mr. Lesley has made it pukka right up to the hills.”
“Ah, now I begin to understand.” Seeming to pull himself together, he apologized slowly and elaborately for the accident. Ronny murmured, “Not at all,” but apologies were his due, and should have started sooner: because English people are so calm at a crisis, it is not to be assumed that they are unimportant. The Nawab Bahadur had not come out very well.
At that moment a large car approached from the opposite direction. Ronny advanced a few steps down the road, and with authority in his voice and gesture stopped it. It bore the inscription “Mudkul State” across its bonnet. All friskiness and friendliness, Miss Derek sat inside.
“Mr. Heaslop, Miss Quested, what are you holding up an innocent female for?”
“We’ve had a breakdown.”
“But how putrid!”
“We ran into a hyena!”
“How absolutely rotten!”
“Can you give us a lift?”
“Yes, indeed.”