Quickly she opened it, and drew out a lady’s motor-cap and veil with a talc front, and a big, heavy, fur-lined coat.
For a moment she looked at them in hesitation. Then, glancing up and down the road to see if she were observed, she took off her religious headdress and collar, twisted around her neck the silk scarf she found in the box, pinned on her hat and adjusted her veil in such a manner that it struck me she was no novice at motoring, even though she were a nun, and then, with my assistance, she struggled into the fur-lined coat.
The stiff linen cap and collar she screwed up and put into the cardboard box, and then, fully equipped for the long journey South, she asked—
“May I come up beside you? I’d love to ride in front.”
“Most certainly, mademoiselle,” I replied. “It won’t then be so lonely for either of us. We can talk.”
In her motor-clothes she was certainly a most dainty and delightful little companion. The hat, veil, and coat had completely transformed her. From a demure little nun she had in a few moments blossomed forth into a piquante little girl, who seemed quite ready to set the convenances at naught as long as she enjoyed herself.
From the business-like manner in which she wrapped the waterproof rug about her skirts and tucked it in herself, I saw that this was not the first time by many that she had been in the front seat of a car.
But a few moments later, when she had settled herself, and I had given her a pair of goggles and helped her to adjust them, I also got up, and we moved away again along that long white highway that traverses France by Sens, Dijon, Maçon, Lyons, Valence, and Digue, and has its end at the rocky shore of the blue Mediterranean at Cannes—that land of flowers and flashy adventurers, which the French term the Côte d’Azur.
From the very first, however, the pretty Pierrette—for her beauty had certainly not been exaggerated by Bindo—was an entire mystery—a mystery which seemed to increase hourly, as you will quickly realise.