I might have to pay my shot, but I was enjoying it. This was a good world through which we were speeding; life was in the high gear to-day. The car purred beneath us like a splendid, harnessed tiger; the spring air was fresh and fragrant, the country charming, with here a forest, there a valley, farther off the tiled, colored roofs of some little town. Our road, like a white ribbon, wound itself out endlessly between stone walls or brown fields. In my content I forgot food and such prosaic details till I noticed that the girl looked pale. “I say,” I exclaimed remorsefully: “we’ve been omitting rolls and coffee! I’m going to get you some at the first town we pass.” “We are coming to a town now, to Le Moreau.” She was looking anxious. “Yes? I’m afraid I don’t place it exactly. Ought I to?” “It is the first town in the war zone. And--and our road passes through it.” “Oh!” I was enlightened. “Then they will probably ask to see our papers at the _octroi_?” “Yes.” The car was eating up the smooth white road; I could see the little _octroi_ building at the town boundary-line, and a group of gendarmes in readiness close by. It was a critical moment. Miss Falconer, I recalled, had said she could get through to Carrefonds; but glittering generalities were not likely to convince these sentries; one needed safe-conducts, passes, identity cards, and such concrete aids. She couldn’t give a reasonable account of herself, I felt quite certain; and even if she did, how was she to account for me? As I brought the car to a standstill, my conscience clamored, and my costume seemed to shriek incongruity from every seam. In this dilemma I trusted to sheer blind luck--a rather thrilling business. As a gray-headed sergeant stepped forward to welcome us, I looked him unfalteringly in the eye, though I wondered if he would not say: “Monsieur, kindly remove that childish travesty with which you are trying to impose on justice. We know all about you. Your name is Devereux Bayne. You are a German agent and intriguer; you have smuggled papers; you have murdered a man and concealed his body. Unless you can give a satisfactory explanation of all your actions since leaving New York, your last hour has arrived!” What he really said was: “Mademoiselle’s papers?” He spoke quite amiably, a catlike pretense, no doubt. Miss Falconer was no longer looking anxious. Her hands were steady; she was even smiling as she produced two neat little packets that, on being unfolded, proved to have all the air of permits, _laissez-passers_, and police cards. Two nondescript photographs, which might have represented almost any one, adorned them, and of these our sergeant made a perfunctory survey. “Mademoiselle’s name,” he recited in a high singsong, “is Marie Le Clair. She is a nurse, on her way to the hospital at Carrefonds. And this is Jacques Carton, who is her chauffeur?”