y busy man. Sir Richmond's brown gauntness was, he noted,
greatly set off by his suit of grey. There had certainly been some sort
of quarrel. Sir Richmond was explaining the straps to Dr. Martineau's
butler with the coldness a man betrays when he explains the uncongenial
habits of some unloved intimate. And when the moment came to start and
the little engine did not immediately respond to the electric starter,
he said: "Oh! COME up, you--!"

His voice sank at the last word as though it was an entirely
confidential communication to the little car. And it was an extremely
low and disagreeable word. So Dr. Martineau decided that it was not his
business to hear it....

It was speedily apparent that Sir Richmond was an experienced and
excellent driver. He took the Charmeuse out into the traffic of
Baker Street and westward through brisk and busy streets and roads
to Brentford and Hounslow smoothly and swiftly, making a score of
unhesitating and accurate decisions without apparent thought. There
was very little conversation until they were through Brentford. Near
Shepherd's Bush, Sir Richmond had explained, "This is not my own
particular car. That was butted into at the garage this morning and
its radiator cracked. So I had to fall back on this. It's quite a good
little car. In its way. My wife drives it at times. It has one or two
constitutional weaknesses--incidental to the make--gear-box over the
back axle for example--gets all the vibration. Whole machine rather on
the flimsy side. Still--"

He left the topic at that.

Dr. Martineau said something of no consequence about its being a very
comfortable little car.

Somewhere between Brentford and Hounslow, Sir Richmond plunged into
the matter between them. "I don't know how deep we are going into these
psychological probings of yours," he said. "But I doubt very much if we
shall get anything out of them."

"Probably not," said Dr. Martineau.

"After all, what I want is a tonic. I don't see that there is anything
positively wrong with me. A certain lack of energy--"

"Lack of balance," corrected the doctor. "You are wasting energy upon
internal friction."

"But isn't that inevitable? No machine is perfectly efficient. No man
either. There is always a waste. Waste of the type; waste of the
individual idiosyncrasy. This little car, for instance, isn't pulling as
she ought to pull--she never does. She's low in her class. So with
myself; there is a natural and necessa