“Leaving car unattended. An infernal swindle, when you think of the loose carts outside every pub in the county. I was jawing with the police for an hour, but it’s no use. They’ve got it all their own way, and we’re helpless.”
Hereupon I told him my tale, and for proof, as we topped the hill, pointed out the little group round my car.
All supreme emotion is dumb. Kysh put on the brake and hugged me to his bosom till I groaned. Then, as I remember, he crooned like a mother returned to her suckling.
“Divine! Divine!” he murmured. “Command me.”
“Take charge of the situation,” I said. “You’ll find a Mr. Pyecroft on the quarter-deck. I’m altogether out of it.”
“He shall stay there. Who am I but the instrument of vengeance in the hands of an over-ruling Providence? (And I put in fresh sparking-plugs this morning.) Salmon, take that steam-kettle home, somehow. I would be alone.”
“Leggat,” I said to my man, “help Salmon home with my car.”
“Home? Now? It’s hard. It’s cruel hard,” said Leggat, almost with a sob.
Hinchcliffe outlined my car’s condition briefly to the two engineers. Mr. Pyecroft clung to our guest, who stared with affrighted eyes at the palpitating Octopod; and the free wind of high Sussex whimpered across the ling.
“I am quite agreeable to walkin’ ’ome all the way on my feet,” said our guest. “I wouldn’t go to any railway station. It ’ud be just the proper finish to our little joke.” He laughed nervously.