He congratulated himself too soon. The inhabitants of Ilchester, indeed, escaped with their lives. Three main roads unite to run through their village, so they have learnt to be exceedingly alert and active. Lord Colavon had not so much as a broken collar-bone on his conscience when he pressed his foot on the accelerator at the end of the village. But a few miles along the road the engine began to give trouble. Jimmy was perfectly sure that he knew what was the matter with it. He spent ten minutes in oily work with a spanner. After that, things became rapidly worse. Noises of the most terrifying kind became frequent, and it was no longer possible to persuade the Pallas Athene to do more than thirty miles an hour on a level stretch of road. Jimmy, less confident than he had been that he knew what was the matter, left his direct road and went to Taunton. There he sought help in a garage while the two girls had tea. The mechanic, an intelligent and competent man, shook his head over the Pallas Athene. He preferred a soberer and more reliable kind of car, even if it could not be driven very fast. In his opinion it would be folly to go on any farther, and he spoke vaguely of telegraphing to the makers of the car for some spare parts. "Spare parts be damned," said Jimmy. "That means waiting here for the best part of a week." The mechanic could not deny that the getting of spare parts is often a tedious business, especially--here he glanced with dislike at the Pallas Athene--"from the makers of cars like that." "Can't you patch her up somehow," said Jimmy, "so that I can push on another forty or fifty miles? I haven't much more than that to do." "I can patch her up," said the mechanic, "but there's no man living can tell how far she'll run afterwards." Being a cautious man, experienced in the ways of motor-cars, he refused, even when pressed, to give any exact estimate of the distance which the patched Pallas Athene might run. The only thing he regarded as certain was that she would break down completely in the end. "It might be two miles out of the town," he said, "or it might be a hundred." "Do the best you can with her while I'm getting a cup of tea," said Jimmy. "Then fill up her tank and give her a pint of oil. I'll risk it." The behaviour of the Pallas Athene after leaving Taunton was excellent. It may have been that the hour's rest in the garage revived her. More probably she was pleased by the attention she received from the mechanic. All women, even dignified Greek goddesses, like being fussed over and petted. Jimmy was moderate in his demands for speed and did not demand anything more than what he called "a funeral trot" of thirty-five miles an hour. Exeter was passed successfully, and the time came when the main road must be left for the last stage of the journey.