Page:C N and A M Williamson - The Lightning Conductor.djvu/270

 follow up his; and anyway, if we disappeared he wouldn't know where to find us. I suppose that was very bad and sly of me, wasn't it? I sent word to Brown that we'd start at nine o'clock next morning; and wasn't it a joke on me, after we'd been on the road for a while I told him what had happened, and it turned out that he'd taken the letter to re-address to his master?

Just before we started Jimmy said he'd had a wire from Lord Lane that his car was waiting for him at the garage in the Boulevard Gambetta at Nice, and we went there after our splendid drive from Cannes, as Brown knew about the place, and thought it would be convenient to leave our Napier there.

We sent our luggage by cab to our hotel, lunched at a delightful restaurant, and in the afternoon, said Jimmy gaily, "I'll race you to Monte and back with my Panhard." I knew in a minute what he meant, but Aunt Mary thought he was talking about his everlasting Lord Lane, and was so disappointed to find it was only Monte Carlo. His Montie, he explained, was seedy and confined to bed but he hoped we wouldn't mention this before Brown, as Lord Lane didn't want his friend Jack Winston to hear that he had come to the Riviera without letting him know.

So after lunch we started away from glittering, flowery blue and white and golden Nice by the most glorious coast road for Monte Carlo, But you know it well, dear Dad. I suppose there can be nothing more beautiful on earth. And Monte Carlo is beautiful; but somehow its beauty doesn't seem real and