as fir trees in a Norwegian forest. But suddenly the
motor slowed, and stopped with a tired sigh within sight of a village
white as newly polished silver.

"Petrol gone," said Ropes. "It oughtn't to be, but it is. Extra strain in
that short cut of the Duke's used it up."

He got out, and untied a _bidon_ from the reserve store fastened upon the
foot-board. But the tin was light in his hand as a feather. He gave a low
whistle, and a shadow darkened his face, a shadow which was not made by
the brim of his motor-cap as he bent his head to examine the _bidon_.

"There's a leak here, sir," he said to me--for though Dick was now supposed
to be his master, in moments of stress he clung to old habits. "Looks as
if the tin had been pricked with some sharp instrument. H'm! Shouldn't
wonder if it had been. It would be of a piece with all the rest."

"You mean at Toledo?"

"Yes, sir. Everything was right, then. I bought enough petrol in Madrid to
last to Cordoba, pretty well all we could carry, and ordered more to meet
us there, _grande vitesse_, in case I couldn't get it--as you said we were
sure now to go that way."

"Well, let's look at your other bidons. We shall be in a fix if we're held
up here."

"Two more empty," announced Ropes. "And three _bidons_ don't suddenly take
to leaking, of themselves. I suppose if I'd had my wits about me, I'd have
looked, at Toledo, before starting; but who's to think of everything? I
did have a thorough go at the car, for fear of mischief, but forgot the
_bidons_ However, there's one to go on with, I'm pretty sure; for it's
stowed away in a place nobody would think of, if they had to do the
villain act in a hurry."

Whereupon he handed out a new _bidon_ from the tool box, and we both gave
a sigh of relief to see that it was intact. At least, we had now enough to
get us to Manzanares; and at worst we could but be hung up there while
Ropes went back by train as far as Madrid to buy petrol.

While we had been making these discoveries, however, the village had been
discovering us. It was not the time of year, as Pilar said, for bears and
monkeys to arrive by road, therefore when something was seen approaching
rapidly and stopping suddenly, the inhabitants of the white town had not
been able to bear the suspense. Somebody had given the word that there was
a thing to see, and out Torralba came pouring in its hundreds, a brilliant
procession a full quarter of a mile long.

Youth and beauty