Lord Hovenden set off again. On the sky-line, lifted high above the rolling table-land over which they were travelling, the solitary blue shape of Monte Amiata beckoned from far away. With every mile to southward the horns of the white oxen that dragged the carts became longer and longer. A sneeze—one ran the risk of a puncture; a sideways toss of the head—one might have been impaled on the hard and polished points. They passed through San Quirico; from that secret and melancholy garden within the walls of the ruined citadel came a whiff of sun-warmed box. In Pienza they found the Platonic idea of a city, the town with a capital T; walls with a gate in them, a short street, a piazza with a cathedral and palaces round the other three sides, another short street, another gate and then the fields, rich with corn, wine and oil; and the tall blue peak of Monte Amiata looking down across the fertile land. At Montepulciano there were more palaces and more churches; but the intellectual beauty of symmetry was replaced by a picturesque and precipitous confusion. “Gosh!” said Lord Hovenden expressively, as they slid with locked wheels down a high street that had been planned for pack-asses and mules. From pedimented windows between the pilasters of the palaces, curious faces peered out at them. They tobogganed down, through the high renaissance, out of an arch of the Middle Ages, into the dateless and eternal fields. From Montepulciano they descended on to Lake Trasimene. “Wasn’t there a battle here, or something?” asked Irene, when she saw the name on the map. Lord Hovenden seemed to remember that there had indeed been something of the kind in this neighbourhood. “But it doesn’t make much difference, does it?” Irene nodded; it certainly didn’t seem to make much difference. “Nofing makes any difference,” said Lord Hovenden, making himself heard with difficulty in the teeth of a wind which his speedometer registered as blowing at forty-five miles an hour. “Except”—the wind made him bold—“except you.” And he added hastily, in case Irene might try to be severe. “Such a bore going down-hill on a twiddly road like vis. One can’t risk ve slightest speed.” But when they turned into the flat highway along the western shore of the lake, his face brightened. “Vis is more like it,” he said. The wind in their faces increased from a capful to half a gale, from half a gale to a full gale, from a full gale very nearly to a hurricane. Lord Hovenden’s spirits rose with the mounting speed. His lips curved themselves into a smile of fixed and permanent rapture. Behind the glass of his goggles his eyes were very bright. “Pretty good going,” he said. “Pretty good,” echoed Irene. Under her mask, she too was smiling. Between her ears and the flaps of her leather cap the wind made a glorious roaring. She was happy. The road swung round to the left following the southern shore of the lake. “We shall soon be at Perugia,” said Hovenden regretfully. “What a bore!”