the package signified, the sergeant, who had formerly
served in the artillery, went white: his voice was stern.

"This is serious--very serious--it is the mouthpiece of a large
gun--larger than any I have come across!"

* * * * *

The recovered motor-car drew up before _The Flowery Crossways_ with a
flourish. The beaming chauffeur jumped down and went towards the
hotel-keeper and the police sergeant.

"It was my car all right!" he cried. "And I believed that never again
should I set eyes on it!... When I think."...

The chauffeur stopped short; the unresponsive hotel-keeper and the
police sergeant were staring at him fixedly. Not a word did they
utter.

The chauffeur stared in turn: then he asked:

"Well?... What is it?... Are you frozen, you two?... What's the matter
with you?... I inform you that I have found my motor, and that's how
you take it!"

The police sergeant answered:

"I must ask you to give us some highly necessary information and
explanations.... Do you know anything about the priest and the soldier
who hired your car and you?"

There was a questioning pause. The chauffeur broke it.

"I have already told you that I do not know them.... If I did, things
would not have happened as they have!... Now, why have you asked me
that question?"

The policeman's reply was another question: his tone was stern.

"Then you declare you had no idea of what they were taking with them
in your car?"

"What they were taking with them in my car?" repeated the chauffeur in
a tone of bewildered interrogation.

The police sergeant marched up to him.

"Look here, now! It is incredible that you do not know what is in that
corded-up package you carried in your car! And now your masters have
disappeared; we are to believe that you know nothing about that
either!... And now you return!... What is the reason of that?... And
is it to be supposed that I am going to allow you to make off again
without asking you to explain yourself and this extraordinary
situation?"

The chauffeur saw that the hotel-keeper sided with the police
sergeant: there was no support to be got in that quarter.

"Explain yourself, policeman!" burst out the chauffeur. "What's all
this humbugging claptrap you are giving me?"

"In the name of the law!" declared the offended police officer, in
solemn tones: "I think it advisable to arrest you!... You may consider
yourself my prisoner!"...

As the astounded ch