"What on earth d'you mean, Dick?"
"Collaboration. You've completed the plot."
He changed his seat to face her from the opposite corner; looked at his watch, and thereafter gazed steadily from the window with down-bent eyes for so long that Amaryllis grew bored and nervous.
"Two minutes to do a mile," he said at last, having again looked at his watch. "It's fifteen minutes since we left Harthborough—seven miles and a half. That's another seven and a half to go—Todsmoor's the station, I think. They'll try it on within five minutes, or give it up. What did you do with that snoring beast's automatic?"
Amaryllis thrust her hand deep into the Brundage pocket, rummaging.
"What an awful pouch!" he exclaimed.
"It is a bottomless pit, certainly. But it's much discreeter than yours are, Dick. They bulge so interestingly, and make you an awfuller sight than all the rest of your funny things together," she replied, laughing at him.
Successful at last, she produced the Browning pistol which Melchard had surrendered on the Roman road. "But it bumped horribly when I walked—and it would always knock the same place on my knee. Oh, Dick, shall we ever get into clothes that'll feel nice again?"
"To-night, damsel, shalt thou sleep in fine linen, and to-morrow, so it please you, shalt fare homeward in thy father's chariot, leaving in that progress a ravaged Marshall and Snelgrove, an eviscerated Lewis, and the house of Harrod but a warehouse of mourning."
Softly he let down both windows, fearing glass little less than bullets.