"Very good, sir!" said the chauffeur. "Left, it is, and—" He broke short off. "There they are!" he cried excitedly. "Listen! They're coming out of that lane there, over to the right!" He swung the motor sharply into the straight of the main road. "There they are! See 'em!" he cried again, as the headlights brought the rear of a speeding motor into view. "The old general back there in the house was right. They didn't bring their motor any nearer for fear it would be heard. That's where it has been—up the lane there. But we've got 'em now! This old girl'll touch seventy and never turn a hair."
"Corking!" contributed Captain Francis Newcombe enthusiastically. "You're sure of the seventy, are you?"
"Rather!" exclaimed the chauffeur. "Look for yourself, sir. We're overhauling them now like one o'clock."
The ex-captain of territorials for a moment stared intently along the headlights' rays to where, gradually, the other motor was coming more and more into focus.
"By Jove, I believe you're right!" he agreed heartily—and from the pocket of his dressing gown produced the Earl's revolver.
The motor was lurching now with the speed. A hundred yards intervening between the flying cars diminished to seventy-five—to fifty. Still closer! The men in the tonneau clung to their seats. Twenty-five yards!
Captain Francis Newcombe shouted to his companions over the roar and sweep of the wind.
"I'll take a pot at the beggars, and see if that'll stop 'em!" he yelled. "Better chance over the top of the windshield, what?"
Captain Francis Newcombe stood up, swayed with the car, fired twice in quick succession and once after a short pause over the top of the windshield—but the ex-captain of territorials' mark seemed curiously comprehensive in expanse, for his eyes were at the same time searching the side of the road ahead. And now there showed at the end of the headlight's path a hedgerow bordering close against the side of the road. Captain Francis Newcombe fired again, but as the car lurched now the ex-captain of territorials seemed momentarily to lose his balance, and with the lurch swayed heavily against the chauffeur's arm.
There was a startled yell from the chauffeur; a vicious swerve—and the big motor leaped at the hedge. Came a crash of splintering glass as Captain Francis Newcombe was pitched head first against the windshield; a rip and rend and tear as the motor bucked and plunged and twisted in its conflict with the thick, heavy hedge; and then a terrific jolt that in its train brought a full stop.