He relapsed into profound meditations, while the car hummed onwards through the moon-drenched spaces of the night.
Presently he roused and, without warning, clambered over the back of the seat into the place beside the chauffeur. For a time the two conferred, heads together, their words indistinguishable in the sweep of air. Then, in the same spry fashion, the little man returned.
“Spelvin’s a treasure,” he announced, settling into his place.
“Why?”
“Knows the country—knows a man in Barmouth who runs a shipyard, owns and hires out motorboats, and all that sort of thing.”
“Where’s Barmouth?”
“Four miles this side of Pennymint Point. Now we’ve got to decide whether to hold on and run our chances of picking up Ismay’s boat, or turn off to Barmouth and run our chances of finding chauffeur’s friend with boat disengaged. What do you think?”
“Barmouth,” Staff decided after some deliberation but not without misgivings.
“That’s what I told Spelvin,” observed Iff. “It’s a gamble either way.”
The city was now well behind them, the car pounding steadily on through Westchester. For a long time neither spoke. The time for talk, indeed, was past—and in the future; for the present they must tune themselves up to action—such action as the furious onrush of the powerful car in some measure typified, easing the impatience in their hearts.