"We must be going." She laughed. I wished she hadn't that characteristic little turn of the head that was so beguiling!
Folly rode with us all the way to Barton. If anything sensible was uttered on the drive, I can't recall it. Our talk, chiefly of knights and ladies, and wild flights from imaginary enemies, had the effect of spurring Flynn to perilous spurts of speed.
"Flynn has caught the spirit!" cried Alice exultingly. "Haven't you, Flynn?"
Flynn, turning to confirm this, caused the car to swerve and graze a truck piled high with household goods.
"We may elude the pursuing knights," I suggested, "but some village constable may take it into his head to pinch us."
"Oh, that would be lovely," cried Alice. "And we'd telegraph dear Mr. Torrence to come and bail us out."
We reached Barton at nine o'clock and after an informal supper I listened to Antoine's solemn reports as I walked to the garage. The prisoner had made no sign, he said, and nothing had occurred during the day.
"But there's this, Mr. Singleton, which you ought to know, sir. The old Tyringham people don't like the goings on here. You'll admit it's all mighty queer. I don't complain, sir, but some of the boys threatens to leave, sir. And I look at it this way, that nobody understanding what the spying and bribes offered and taking prisoners is all about, is most peculiar. We got to know where we stand, that's what it's come to, sir. And the widow being flighty-like and Flynn coming home and saying nothing, but shaking his head when we ask him where he's been—You see for yourself, sir, how it looks to us."
What he said as to the general aspect of things was true, but I didn't admit that it was true. Alice had converted me to the notion that I was a character in a story, a plaything of fate, and I lightly brushed aside Antoine's melancholy plaint.
"Any man of you," I said, "who leaves this property will be brought back and shot. Tell that to the boys!"