usual, he who was
the least to blame came in for the hottest of the censure; and yet,
there was a sort of fellowship indicated by Chamberlain's extraordinary
arraignment of them both. He was scarcely known ever to have been
profane, but at this moment he searched for wicked words and
interspersed his speech with them recklessly, if not with skill. It is
the duty of the historian to expurgate.

"I don't know just how you happen to be in this game," pronounced
Chamberlain hotly, "but all I've got to say is you're an ass--an
infernal ass."

Hand, rolling up his sleeves, remained silent.

"I suppose if you'd had a perfectly good million-dollar bank-note,
you'd have let it blow away--piff! right out of your hands!" he fumed.
"Or the title deed to Mount Olympus--or a ticket to a front seat in the
New Jerusalem. That's all it amounts to. Catch an eel, only to let
him slip through your fingers--eh, you!"

Mr. Hand made no answer. Instead, he waded into the ditch-stream and
placed a shoulder under the racing-car. Chamberlain's instinct for
doing his share of work caused him to roll up his trousers and wade in,
shoulder to shoulder with Hand, even while he was lecturing on the
feebleness of man's wits.

"Good horse running loose into barb-wire fences had to be caught, but
it didn't need a squadron of men and a forty-acre lot to do it in.
Might have known he'd give us the slip if he could--biggest rascal in
Europe!" And so on. Chamberlain, usually rather a silent man, blew
himself empty for once, conscious all the time that he, himself, was
quite as much to blame as Hand could possibly have been. And Hand knew
that he knew, but kept his counsel. Hand ought to be prime minister by
this time.

When the racing-car was righted, he went swiftly and skilfully to work
investigating the damage and putting the machine in order, as far as
possible. Chamberlain presently became impressed with his mechanical
dexterity.

"By Jove, you can see into her, can't you!" Hand continued silent, and
left it to his companion to put on the finishing verbal touches.

"Tow her home and fill her up and she'll be all right, eh?" said
Chamberlain, but Hand kept on tinkering. The sudden neighing and
plunging of Little Simon's poor tormented horse gave warning of the
sheriff, crashing from the underbrush directly into the road.

He was voluble with excuses. The fugitive had escaped, leaving no
traces of his flight. He might be in the