"H'm; three coats of seccotine--have to allow each twenty minutes to dry--call it an hour. After that I think if we couple up the union, and put in the spare gasolene your man says he's got, you should go sailing off without a hitch. By the way, I didn't know you motored." "I'm full of unpleasant surprises." "Yes, Cascaes, for instance." "Well, why shouldn't I open up an O'Neill and Craven agency in Las Palmas, pray?" "No reason whatever. I wasn't referring to Cascaes' business abilities." "Wagner," said Miss O'Neill to her man, "there's a farm about a mile down this road where they'll bandage up your wrist, and make you some sort of a sling. Don't be away longer than you can help. Mr. Carter and I will look after the car till you get back." "Thank you'm," said the driver, and marched off into the night. They stared after him till the sound of his footfalls on the hard road died away, and then said Miss O'Neill, "Why doesn't Mr. Cascaes answer when I cable?" "You can hardly expect me to overlook the work of your Las Palm as agency." "Don't quibble. Do you know why he is silent?" "I can make a guess." "Well, go on." "He's probably too busy picking aloe thorns out of his carcass to find time for writing cables." "Oh, so you threw him into an aloe hedge, did you? What did Laura say to that?" "Well, as she knew nothing about it, she naturally did not comment." "I see; and did Mr. Cascaes object?" "Not obtrusively. He took the best licking I ever gave to man or dog without a whimper, and when I tossed him amongst those aloe hooks, he lay there just as he fell." "Ah," said Kate, and drew a long breath. "Keen on motoring?" Carter asked after a pause. "I am, yes." "I'm taking a light four-cylinder back to the Islands with me." "Let me see, I promised you a wedding present, didn't I? Let me know when it's for, and what you'll have. By the way, talking of coincidences, I was motoring in the Yorkshire dales a week or so ago, and coming down out of Wensleydale into Wharfedale, we dropped down over a perfectly terrific piece of road that cost me a back tire. Well, unluckily we'd used up the only other spare cover on the car already, so the only thing left was to go slowly on the rim on into the village below and wire for another. "Such a dear old village it was, of gray stone houses, tucked away under the gray limestone hills, with all the gardens as bright with flowers as you find them in a story-book. The parson saw us when we came in from skating down that awful hill, and when he saw me afterwards strolling round looking at the flowers, he very nicely asked me to go in and look at his roses. A splendid old man he was, and such gorgeous roses. He likes big blooms, and he snips off the superfluous buds on the sly, and Mrs. Parson likes lots of blooms to cut at and to give away, and she's always on the watch after him to see he doesn't steal those buds. I met her, too, and they took me in and gave me tea.