"I like that lad," he muttered in the car. "He does nothing by halves. No more do I! Do you mind dropping me first at Portman Square?"
Dollar gave the order, and they slid through the empty streets as though man and car were fresh from the garage. There was not a soul in Portman Square, or a light in any of the houses except the Home Secretary's. They had telephoned through from Stockersham after his departure, and the door opened as he emptied his remaining sovereigns into the chauffeur's hand, before taking Dollar's with no lack of warmth.
"I can't ask you in this time," said Topham Vinson, smiling. "Apart from the hour, I've got to go straight to the telephone, get through to Pentonville, and spoil the Governor's night!"
"Reprieved?" gasped the doctor. It was the one word that would come.
The Home Secretary nodded rather grimly, but was smiling as he shut the door almost on the hand with which John Dollar would have seized his once more. There was a shooting of bolts inside.
Dollar turned slowly round, wondering if at last he could tell the little driver something about the night's enterprise in which he had played so heroic a part. There was no need. The driver had kept eyes and ears wide open—and collapsed once more over the wheel. This time it was not in sleep, but in a dead faint; and the driving goggles were all awry, the driver's hat had tumbled off, the driver's hair had broken bounds.
It was a girl's hair, and the girl was Lady Vera Moyle.