The little yellow car was only a two-seater, but it held three at a pinch. Mavis, in the middle, sat as far back as possible, so as not to incommode Uncle David's left arm as he drove, while Merle sat a little forward, to give extra room. Jessop tucked the rug over their knees, Tom started the engine, Aunt Nellie waved good-bye out of the open window, and at last they were off, over the bridge and along the road that led to the south. It was a lovely sunny morning, with great fleecy clouds on the horizon, and a blue sky overhead. Small birds were flitting about in the hedges, and large flocks of rooks and starlings were feeding in the ploughed fields. The banks were green with masses of beautiful hart's-tongue ferns, and all nature seemed alive and stirring and thinking of spring. The car whizzed along at a good pace, and they were soon scaling the hill and crossing the portion of the moor that lay between Durracombe and Chagmouth. The glistening drops from yesterday's showers still shone on the brown heather, sheep were feeding on the patches of fine grass, and wild little ponies stampeded away at the approach of the car, as if they were running a race with motor power. It was so beautiful on the uplands that the girls were quite sorry when the open, hedgeless road dipped between banks into a valley and turned into the orthodox deep Devonshire lane. Down and down they went, so steeply that Uncle David seemed to be hanging on to the brakes, and for at least two miles there was no occasion to use the engine, then quite suddenly they whisked round a bend of the road and caught a glimpse of the village lying below them. Chagmouth came afterwards to mean so much to Mavis and Merle that they never forgot their first sight of it. It burst upon them, a compact mass of picturesque houses lying huddled between two magnificent headlands crowned with gorse and brown bracken.