hat," said Dick.

"Let's rush it," said I.

"Too risky. You'd feel such a limp ass to be detained by a fat policeman
at the door of Spain, while Carmona and Lady Monica went through, and
disappeared."

"I'd shoot the fat policeman first."

"There you are, being Spanish again, just when you ought to develop a
little horse-sense."

This put me on my mettle, and in two minutes I had thought out a plan,
while Dick whistled and reflected.

It was rather an odd plan, and could only be carried out by the aid of
another. But that other had never failed me yet, when loyalty or devotion
were needed; and I had not got out half the suggestion when he understood
all, and begged to do what I had hardly liked to ask.

We took exactly eight minutes, by Dick's watch, in making arrangements to
meet an emergency which I hoped might not arise if our speed were good and
our luck held.

Already Hendaye, the last French town, was but just beyond our sight. We
ran through it at high speed, passed on through little Behobie; and next
moment our tyres were rolling through a brown mixture of French and
Spanish mud on the international bridge that crosses the swirling Bidasoa.
We had passed from Gaul to Iberia. At the central iron lamp-post, carrying
on one side the "R.F." of France, on the other the Royal Arms of Spain, I
lifted my cap in salutation to my native land, just where, had I been an
Englishman, I should have lifted it to memories of grand old Wellington.

The broad river was rushing, green and swift, down to Fuenterrabia and the
sea, eddying past the little Ile des Faisans, where so much history has
been made; where Cardinals treated for royal marriages; where Francis the
First, a prisoner, was exchanged for his two sons. We were across the
dividing water now, in Irun, and on Spanish soil. High-collared Spanish
soldiers lounging by their sentry boxes, looked keenly at us, but made no
move, little guessing that the accused bomb-thrower of Barcelona was
driving past them through this romantic gate to Spain. We turned abruptly
to the right, and, hoping still to escape trouble, pulled up at the
custom-house.

To hurry a Spanish official, I had often heard my father say, in old days,
is a thing impossible, and we avoided an air of anxiety. The three men in
the big red car appeared to desire nothing better than to linger in the
society of the _douaniers_. Nevertheless, the chauffeur was as brisk in
his movements as he dared to be.