Page:The Strand Magazine (Volume 30).djvu/311

Rh us. One or two of the group made a half-hearted dash down the road, but stopped on realizing the futility of giving chase. Assistance was out of the question.

"They're all right," said the owner of the car, without emotion, "if they know how to steer; and it's simple enough. Yes, there they go round the corner. They're all right."

"ASSISTANCE WAS OUT OF THE QUESTION."

A buzz of conversation began. We all discussed the incident at one and the same time. The only person who made no contribution to the discussion was Charlie. He lit a cigar.

Dacre pulled a watch out of the pocket of his blazer.

"We ought to be starting again soon," he said. "It's nearly three. When do you think those two men will be coming back?"

Charlie blew the ash off his cigar.

"That," he said, "I can't say. I doubt if either of them knows how to stop the car."

"Good gracious!" exclaimed Dacre. "Then you mean to say they will go on"

"Till the thing runs down, I suppose."

"And when will that be?" I asked.

"Why, I couldn't say exactly. They've got enough petrol to take them—oh, say fifty miles."

"Fifty—miles!" gasped Dacre.

"Call it forty-five," said Charlie, making a concession,

"Shall we start?" I asked, suavely. "Are your men ready?"

Dacre passed a handkerchief over his forehead. "But—but—but" he said.

"You had better play two substitutes."

"But"

"After all," I said, gently, "their absence cannot be so very important. As you said, they are merely local talent."

He looked at me with eyes that were full of expression.

"Merely local talent," I repeated.

It was shortly after the tea interval, when our score was a hundred and sixty for three wickets, that a small boy entered the field, bearing in his hand a telegram for the bereaved Charlie. It was signed "Smith," and had been dispatched apparently from somewhere in the middle of Cornwall.

"Motor safe," it read. "Returning by train. Tell Dacre not wait dinner."

It was at that moment, I fancy, that the Rev. Joseph Dacre experienced a fleeting regret that he had ever taken holy orders.

Clergymen have to be so guarded in their speech.

And when, an hour later, the Weary Willies won the match with five wickets in hand, this regret may possibly have become keener.