line addressed to him at Nimes, poste restante ....

"But if Monsieur Duchemin would be good enough," Madame de Sévénié
interposed in a fretful quaver--"and if it would not be taking him too
far out of his way--it is night, anything may happen, the car might
break down, and I am an old woman, monsieur, with sorely tried
nerves--"

Looking down at him from her place at the wheel, Madame de Montalais
added: "It would be an act of charity, I think, monsieur, if it does
not inconvenience you too greatly."

"On the contrary," he fabricated without blushing, "you will be
obliging a weary man by putting him several miles on his way."

He had no cause to regret his complaisance. Seated beside Madame de
Montalais, he watched her operate the car with skilful hands, making
the best of a highway none too good, if a city boulevard in comparison
with that which they had covered in the barouche.

Following the meandering Dourbie, it ran snakily from patches of
staring moonlight to patches of inky shadows, now on narrow ledges high
over the brawling stream, now dipping so low that the tyres were almost
level with the plane of broken waters.

The sweep of night air in his face was sweet and smooth, not cold--for
a marvel in that altitude--and stroked his eyelids with touches as
bland as caresses of a pretty woman's fingers. He was sensible of
drowsiness, a surrender to fatigue, to which the motion of the motor
car, swung seemingly on velvet springs, and the shifting, blending