“Well,” said he, “I don’t know what these batteries are made of; they are of solid stuff, not fluid, and yet they all waste very quickly. I doubt if any one of them will carry us as far as we may want to go; indeed, I am not sure that any two of them will be enough.”
“But how are we to get away,” said I; “we are so closely watched?”
“I’ll tell you what I propose,” he said. “We shall not retire to-night until an hour after dark, nor the next night, then we may hope that they will take it as a matter of course that we shall not retire on the third night until the same hour. But on the third night, immediately after dark, we shall make a bolt of it, and so we may hope for an hour’s start.”
“In the car?”
“Well, so I propose. I am aware that there is much to be said in favour of an attempt to escape on foot. These lozenges of theirs are meat and drink. We have had nothing else for several days, and we want nothing [200] ]else, and we know now how many of them we should require, and it is certain that we could easily carry enough to last us three weeks or more. And if we make a bee-line for the wire we ought to reach it within three weeks or less. Besides, if we escape on foot they will not know where to look for us. We shall have cover among the trees, whereas in the air we shall have no cover.”
“Not even if we escape in an invisible car?”
“There is none of the cars invisible to them.”
“Ah! so I was beginning to think.”
“I am quite sure of it.”
“Well, go on.”