Eves eyed the tricycle dubiously. "It’ll be the dickens of a job to fix this heavy tank," he said. "Oh, we’ll manage it. There’s plenty of wire about, and we can hunt up something that will do for stays." They worked energetically all the afternoon. Templeton’s patience and ingenuity triumphed over all difficulties. The tank slipped off several times, but at last it was firmly fixed with an elaborate arrangement of stays and wire, and when Mrs. Trenchard returned, between five and six o’clock, she beheld her guests careering round the farmyard, making a trial trip. "Well, I never did see!" she exclaimed, pulling up the horse at the gate. "Whatever hev happened to the old tricycle?" Eves waved his hand gleefully. "Splendid!" he cried, as Templeton halted the machine beside the cart. "A new invention, Mrs. Trenchard." "’Tis like the butcher’s contraption I saw in the town, only the box is behind instead of afore. What be the hidden meaning of that, I’d like to know?" "It won’t be hidden long, Mrs. Trenchard. But the sun will be hidden; there’ll be an eclipse to-night." "Go along with your rubbish, Mr. Eves. The sun will go down at his proper time, whatever the clocks do say; they Parlyment men up along at Lunnon can’t make no eclipses, don’t think it." "Templeton means to; don’t you, Bob?" "He _does_ talk rubbish, Mrs. Trenchard," said Templeton, earnestly. "All that he means is that we’re going to try making a thick smoke, to see if we can hide our ships from the German submarines." "Well, never did I hear the like o’ that! You’ll need a powerful deal o’ smoke, Mr. Templeton." "Of course, this is only experimental, on a very small scale. If it succeeds——" "He’ll be rolling in wealth, and you shall have a new bonnet, Mrs. Trenchard," said Eves. "Ah, me! That do remind me of my boy Joe, to be sure; allers a-going to be rich and gie me a new bonnet. And now, poor boy, he’s in them there horrible trenches, and the rats——" "Cheer up, Mrs. Trenchard," said Eves, hastily, spying a tear. "I’m sorry for the rats, from what you’ve told us of Joe. I’m sure you want your tea after your long day. We want ours, I can tell you; and after tea, Templeton will give you a demonstration of this splendid invention. I say, Bob," he added, when Mrs. Trenchard had gone into the house, "while they’re making tea there’ll be just time for you to cut down to the village and buy some firelighters at old Noakes’s. I don’t suppose he’d serve me. Hurry up." Mr. Trenchard returning from the fields a few minutes later, Eves unburdened himself. "I say, Mr. Trenchard," he said, "when I told you we scared a slug, I didn’t mean one of those small slimy things, you know. I meant Mr. Noakes. I caught him poking his nose into your papers this morning. I think you ought to know." "Do ’ee tell me that, now?" said the farmer, looking distressed.