irection of St. Albans.

"Gone away, sir," he said.

"Hurt?" asked Forrest, pausing as he did so.

"Not much; smashed shoulder, I fancy," remarked the sufferer
philosophically.

"I'll send assistance," said my companion as he rushed after me into the
road, where I stood horror stricken at what met my gaze.

Fifty yards distant, opposite the entrance gate of Colonel Maitland's
house, the new car was standing still. It was empty. The gate was open,
and even as I watched, I saw Mannering come out of the gate, bearing in
his arms the helpless figure of a girl. There was no need to guess who
the victim might be. Even before I saw him appear, I knew intuitively
why he had stopped. Had he not told Evie that on the third day he would
return, bidding her be ready for him?

I rushed forward towards the car, but before I had covered half the
distance which separated me from it, he was aboard with his burden and I
knew pursuit on foot to be hopeless.

Yet, even as I saw him move away, there flashed across my brain one
means by which I might possibly get on terms with my enemy. There was
just one chance, and one chance only, of rescuing my darling from the
Pirate, and that chance depended entirely upon the question as to
whether the car upon which Mannering had returned was fitted with the
same sort of motor as that on which he had departed.

With the haste of a madman I returned to the coach-house I had just
quitted. My hopes fell to zero. There was an unmistakable scent of
petrol about the car. They rose again, however, upon a closer
examination, for I saw at once that the motor was a turbine, though
petrol was utilized in some way as a means of securing the necessary
heat to secure the expansion of the gas for the starting of the engine,
though I could see that once started, the expanded hydrogen was, as in
the new car, ingeniously utilized to produce the necessary heat. I was
glad then that I had spent as much time as I had upon examining the car
upon which the Pirate had escaped, for I was enabled to see that, if
only a supply of the liquid hydrogen were obtainable, I should be able
to put my wild plan into execution. As it was, the tank was nearly
empty, so putting my shoulder to the car, I shoved it into the workshop
where, unless Mannering had let it run to waste, I knew I should find a
supply of the hydrogen. Thank Heaven, Mannering had forgot to empty the
receiver, and filling the tank and tightly screwing down th