rings bound up with a million yards of stout
cord, on purpose; and those extra buffers of India rubber Ropes put on to
keep the tyres from grinding against the mud guards; so we ought to get
off pretty well at worst," remarked Dick. "As for me, I shall feel
defrauded if the car doesn't soon begin to bound like a chamois from one
frightful obstacle to another, along the surface of the road, such ghastly
things have been dinned into my ears about Castile and La Mancha. So far,
we've nothing to complain of, and have been on velvet, compared to some of
the _pave_ atrocities one remembers in Belgium and northern France."

"I daresay we shall come to the chamois act yet," said I. "But, so far,
we're still in the heart of civilization. Here's San Sebastian, and here's
a cafe close to where Carmona must pass, so let's stop and lie in wait."

IX

A STERN CHASE

We were on the outskirts of San Sebastian, and to reach the cafe we turned
off the main road and ran the car into a side street. There, without being
ourselves conspicuous, we could see all that passed along the road beyond.
We had some vermouth, sitting at a little iron table outside the cafe
door, to excuse our presence. Every moment we expected to see the Duke's
car shoot by, but time went on, and it did not come. We finished our first
edition of vermouth and had a second, with which we toyed and did not
drink, by way of keeping our place.

Had they punctured another tyre? Had Carmona stopped in Irun, and had any
mischance occurred there which might, after all, put the police on my
track?

Dick and I were beginning to get restive, and question each other with
raised eyebrows, when the big grey automobile charged past the end of our
street. Not a head in the car turned in our direction; and laying a couple
of pesetas on the table we sprang to the manning of our own road-ship. So
quick was our start that, when we spun out into the road, there was our
leader still within sight.

I had heard my father speak often of San Sebastian, which, situated in the
heart of the Basque country, had been the great Carlist centre, and even
when Carlist hopes died, retained most stoutly the Carlist traditions.
But, Carlist as he was at heart till the day of his death, he could not
fail to appreciate the tact of Queen Cristina, by whose wish a royal
summer villa had risen over the waters of the bay. Owing to this stroke of
clever polic