“Would you like to think it over before we start?”

Gazing from her short clear-cut face, the very spit of hard, calm, confident youth, to his brother’s long, shrewd face, wrinkled, and worn by the experiences of others and yet not hard, Adrian left it to Hilary to answer.

“Let’s get on,” said Hilary; “it’s a case of making the best of what turns up.”

“When we pass a post-office,” added Adrian, “please stop. I want to send a wire to Dinny.”

Fleur nodded. “There’s one in the King’s Road, I must fill up, too, somewhere.”

And the car slid on among the traffic.

“What shall I say in the wire?” asked Adrian. “Anything about Petworth?”

Hilary shook his head.

“Just that we think we’re on the right track.”

When they had sent the wire there were only two hours left before the train arrived.

“It’s fifty miles to Pulborough,” said Fleur, “and I suppose about five on. I wonder if I can risk my petrol. I’ll see at Dorking.” From that moment on she was lost to them, though the car was a closed saloon, giving all her attention to her driving.

The two brothers sat silent with their eyes on the clock and speedometer.

“I don’t often go joy-riding,” said Hilary, softly: “What are you thinking of, old man?”

“Of what on earth we’re going to do.”

“If I were to think of that beforehand, in my job, I should be dead in a month. In a slum parish one lives, as in a jungle, surrounded by wild cats; one grows a sort of instinct and has to trust to it.”

“Oh!” said Adrian, “I live among the dead, and get no practice.”

“Our niece drives well,” said Hilary in a low voice. “Look at her neck. Isn’t that capability personified?”

The neck, white, round and shingled, was held beautifully erect and gave a remarkable impression of quick close control of the body by the brain.

For several miles after that they drove in silence.

“Box Hill,” said Hilary: “a thing once happened to me hereabouts I’ve never told you and never forgotten, it shows how awfully near the edge of mania we live.” He sunk his voice and went on: “Remember that jolly parson Durcott we used to know? When I was at Beaker’s before I went to Harrow, he was a master there; he took me a walk one Sunday over Box Hill. Coming back in the train we were alone. We were ragging a little, when all of a sudden he seemed to go into a sort of frenzy, his eyes all greedy and wild. I hadn’t the least notion what he was after and was awfully scared. Then, suddenly, he seemed to get hold of himself again. Right out of the blue! Repressed sex, of course—regular mania for the moment—pretty horrible. A very nice fellow, too. There are forces, Adrian.”

“Daemonic. And when they break the shell for good… Poor Ferse!”

Fleur’s voice came back to them.

“She’s beginning to go a bit wonky; I must fill up, Uncle Hilary. There’s a station close here.”

“Right-o!”

The car drew up before the filling station.

“It’s always slow work to Dorking,” said Fleur, stretching: “we can get along now. Only thirty-two miles, and a good hour still. Have you thought?”

“No,” said Hilary, “we’ve avoided it like poison.”

Fleur’s eyes, whose whites were so clear, flashed on him one of those direct glances which so convinced people of her intelligence.

“Are you going to take him back in this? I wouldn’t, if I were you.” And, taking out her case, she repaired her lips slightly, and powdered her short straight nose.

Adrian watched her with a sort of awe. Youth, up to date, did not come very much his way. Not her few words, but the implications in them impressed him. What she meant was crudely this: Let him dree his weird—you can do nothing. Was she right? Were he and Hilary just pandering to the human instinct for interference; attempting to lay a blasphemous hand on Nature? And yet for Diana’s sake they must know what Ferse did, what he was going to do. For Ferse’s sake they must see, at least, that he did not fall into the wrong hands. On his brother’s face was a faint smile. He at least, thought Adrian, knew youth, had a brood of his own, and could tell how far the clear hard philosophy of youth would carry.

They started again, trailing through the traffic of Dorking’s long and busy street.

“Clear at last,” said Fleur, turning her head, “if you really want to catch him, you shall;” and she opened out to full speed. For the next quarter of an hour they flew along, past yellowing spinneys, fields and bits of furzy common dotted with geese and old horses, past village greens and village streets, and all the other evidences of a country life trying to retain its soul. And then the car, which had been travelling very smoothly, began to grate and bump.

“Tyre gone!” said Fleur, turning her head: “That’s torn it.” She brought the car to a standstill, and they all got out. The off hind tyre was right down.

“Pipe to!” said Hilary, taking his coat off. “Jack her up, Adrian. I’ll get the spare wheel off.”

Fleur’s head was lost in the tool-box, but her voice was heard saying: “Too many cooks, better let me!”

Adrian’s knowledge of cars was nil, his attitude to machinery helpless; he stood willingly aside, and watched them with admiration. They were cool, quick, efficient, but something was wrong with the jack.

“Always like that,” said Fleur, “when you’re in a hurry.”

Twenty minutes was lost before they were again in motion.

“I can’t possibly do it now,” she said, “but you’ll be able to pick up his tracks easily, if you really want to. The station’s right out beyond the town.”

Through Billingshurst and Pulborough and over Stopham bridge, they travelled at full speed.

“Better go for Petworth itself,” said Hilary, “if he’s heading back for the town, we shall meet him.”

“Am I to stop if we meet him?”

“No, carry straight on past and then turn.”

But they passed through Petworth and on for the mile and a half to the station without meeting him.

“The train’s been in a good twenty minutes,” said Adrian, “let’s ask.”

A porter had taken the ticket of a gentleman in a blue overcoat and black hat. No! He had no luggage. He had gone off, towards the Downs. How long ago? Half an hour, maybe.

Regaining the car hastily they made towards the Downs.

“I remember,” said Hilary, “a little further on there’s a turn to Sutton. The point will be whether he’s taken that or gone on up. There are some houses there somewhere. We’ll ask, they may have seen him.”

Just beyond the turning was a little post-office, and a postman was cycling towards it from the Sutton road.

Fleur pulled the car to a walk alongside.

“Have you seen a gentleman in a blue coat and bowler hat making towards Sutton?”

“No, Miss, ‘aven’t passed a soul.”

“Thank you. Shall I carry on for the Downs, Uncle Hilary?”

Hilary consulted his watch.

“If I remember, it’s a mile about to the top of the Down close to Duncton Beacon. We’ve come a mile and a half from the station; and he had, say, twenty-five minutes’ start, so by the time we get to the top we should have about caught him. From the top we shall see the road ahead and be able to make sure. If we don’t come on him, it’ll mean he’s taken to the Down—but which way?”

Adrian said under his breath: “Homewards.”

“To the East?” said Hilary. “On then, Fleur, not too fast.”

Fleur headed the car up the Downs road.

“Feel in my coat, you’ll find three apples,” she said. “I caught them up.”

“What a head!” said Hilary. “But you’ll want them yourself.”

“No. I’m slimming. You can leave me one.”

The brothers, munching each an apple, kept their eyes fixed on the woods on either side of the car.

“Too thick,” said Hilary; “he’ll be carrying on to the open. If you sight him, Fleur, stop dead.”

But they did not sight him, and, mounting slower and slower, reached the top. To their right was the round beech tree clump of Duncton, to the left the open Down; no figure was on the road in front.