Traffics and Discoveries

"An' you a family man, too," muttered Pyecroft, swinging himself into the right rear seat. "Sure to be a remarkably hectic day when we meet."

We adjusted ourselves and, in the language of the immortal Navy doctor, paved our way towards Linghurst, distant by mile-post 11-3/4 miles.

Mr. Hinchcliffe, every nerve and muscle braced, talked only to the engineer, and that professionally. I recalled the time when I, too, had enjoyed the rack on which he voluntarily extended himself.

And the County of Sussex slid by in slow time.

"How cautious is the 'tiffy-bird!" said Pyecroft.

"Even in a destroyer," Hinch snapped over his shoulder, "you ain't expected to con and drive simultaneous. Don't address any remarks to me!"

"Pump!" said the engineer. "Your water's droppin'."

"I know that. Where the Heavens is that blighted by-pass?"

He beat his right or throttle hand madly on the side of the car till he found the bent rod that more or less controls the pump, and, neglecting all else, twisted it furiously.

My engineer grabbed the steering-bar just in time to save us lurching into a ditch.

"If I was a burnin' peacock, with two hundred bloodshot eyes in my shinin' tail, I'd need 'em all on this job!" said Hinch.

"Don't talk! Steer! This ain't the North Atlantic," Pyecroft replied.

"Blast my stokers! Why, the steam's dropped fifty pounds!" Hinchcliffe cried.

"Fire's blown out," said the engineer. "Stop her!"

"Does she do that often?" said Hinch, descending.

"Sometimes."

"Anytime?"

"Any time a cross-wind catches her."

The engineer produced a match and stooped.

That car (now, thank Heaven, no more than an evil memory) never lit twice in the same fashion. This time she back-fired superbly, and Pyecroft went out over the right rear wheel in a column of rich yellow flame.

"I've seen a mine explode at Bantry – once – prematoor," he volunteered.

"That's all right," said Hinchcliffe, brushing down his singed beard with a singed forefinger. (He had been watching too closely.) "Has she any more little surprises up her dainty sleeve?"

"She hasn't begun yet," said my engineer, with a scornful cough. "Some one 'as opened the petrol-supply-valve too wide."

"Change places with me, Pyecroft," I commanded, for I remembered that the petrol-supply, the steam-lock, and the forced draught were all controlled from the right rear seat.

"Me? Why? There's a whole switchboard full o' nickel-plated muckin's which I haven't begun to play with yet. The starboard side's crawlin' with 'em."

"Change, or I'll kill you!" said Hinchcliffe, and he looked like it.

"That's the 'tiffy all over. When anything goes wrong, blame it on the lower deck. Navigate by your automatic self, then! I won't help you any more."

We navigated for a mile in dead silence.

"Talkin' o' wakes – " said Pyecroft suddenly.

"We weren't," Hinchcliffe grunted.

"There's some wakes would break a snake's back; but this of yours, so to speak, would fair turn a tapeworm giddy. That's all I wish to observe, Hinch. … Cart at anchor on the port-bow. It's Agg!"

Far up the shaded road into secluded Bromlingleigh we saw the carrier's cart at rest before the post-office.

"He's bung in the fairway. How'm I to get past?" said Hinchcliffe.

"There's no room. Here, Pye, come and relieve the wheel!"

"Nay, nay, Pauline. You've made your own bed. You've as good as left your happy home an' family cart to steal it. Now you lie on it."

"Ring your bell," I suggested.

"Glory!" said Pyecroft, falling forward into the nape of Hinchcliffe's neck as the car stopped dead.

"Get out o' my back-hair! That must have been the brake I touched off," Hinchcliffe muttered, and repaired his error tumultuously.

We passed the cart as though we had been all Bruges belfry. Agg, from the port-office door, regarded us with a too pacific eye. I remembered later that the pretty postmistress looked on us pityingly.

Hinchcliffe wiped the sweat from his brow and drew breath. It was the first vehicle that he had passed, and I sympathised with him.

"You needn't grip so hard," said my engineer. "She steers as easy as a bicycle."

"Ho! You suppose I ride bicycles up an' down my engine-room?" was the answer. "I've other things to think about. She's a terror. She's a whistlin' lunatic. I'd sooner run the old South-Easter at Simon's Town than her!"

"One of the nice things they say about her," I interrupted, "is that no engineer is needed to run this machine."

"No. They'd need about seven."

"'Common-sense only is needed,'" I quoted.

"Make a note of that, Hinch. Just common-sense," Pyecroft put in.

"And now," I said, "we'll have to take in water. There isn't more than a couple of inches of water in the tank."

"Where d'you get it from?"

"Oh! – cottages and such-like."

"Yes, but that being so, where does your much-advertised twenty-five miles an hour come in? Ain't a dung-cart more to the point?"