did in a few minutes. I knew by his face before he spoke that something was wrong. "I was a fool to leave the car for even a second till he was out of the way," said the poor fellow. "Every tyre gashed. No doubt he'd have liked to smash up the car altogether if he'd had time, but his object was to do his worst and get off scot free. He's done both. It's thanks to you and your quick thought that the damage is so small."
"If it hadn't been for me he wouldn't have been here," I almost wept. "Now we're delayed again just when I began to hope that all might be well."
"All shall be well," answered Brown encouragingly. "We'll go 'on the rims' as far as Amboise."
I didn't know what it was to go on the rims, but When we'd settled up with the farmer, and I'd said a last, long good-bye to my car's bones (which I made the landlord a present of), I found out. It's something like "going on your uppers." I don't need to explain that, do I? But the car is such a beauty that seeing it with, its tyres en déshabille seemed an indignity. Brown couldn't help showing his pride in it, and I don't wonder. He is certainly a "Mascot" to me, for he has got me out of every scrape I've been in since he "crossed my path," as the melodramas say. And now this lovely car! On the way to Amboise he told me what it was to be let for. Only twenty francs a day. I protested, because Rattray had said that good cars couldn't be hired for less than twenty pounds a week; but Brown explained that this was because his master liked him to drive it, and that really it wasn't so cheap as I thought. I
