"It was quite an ordinary thing," said Burton, rather uncomfortably. The explanation he had given to the questioners was vague; he was loth to tell a deliberate lie. "Do you know anything about petrol engines, sir?"
"Oh yes, certainly. I ride on a motor-bicycle. One has often trouble viz ze compression."
"That's true," said Burton, feeling "warmer" than ever. The foreigner was evidently quite unsuspicious, or he would not have mentioned the motor-cycle. "We have excellent roads in England," he added, with a fishing intention.
"Zat is quite right; but zey are perhaps not so good as our roads in France, eh?"
"Your roads are magnificent, it's true; still--what do you say to the Dover Road?"
"Ah! Ze Dover Road; yes, it is very good, ever since ze Roman times, eh? Yes; I have travelled often on ze Dover Road, from Dover to Chatham, and vice versa. Viz zis bag!"
Burton looked hard at the bag. He wished it would open. One peep, he was sure, would be enough to convict this amiable Frenchman.
"I have somezink in zis bag," the Frenchman went on in a confidential tone--"somezink great, somezink magnificent,--éclatant as we say; somezink vat make a noise in ze vorld."
He tapped the bag affectionately. Burton tingled; he would have liked to take the man by the throat and denounce him as a scoundrel. But perhaps if he were patient the confiding foreigner would open the bag.
"Indeed!" he said.