big sailor in order. He’s too drunk to do much. I’ll change places with the other one. Only be quick; I want to pay my fine and get it over."
"That’s the way to look at it," he said, dropping into the left rear seat. "We’re making quite a lot out o’ you motor gentry." He folded his arms judicially as the car gathered way under Hinchcliffe’s stealthy hand.
"But you aren’t driving!" he cried, half rising.
"You’ve noticed it?" said Pyecroft, and embraced him with one anaconda-like left arm.
"Don’t kill him," said Hinchcliffe briefly. "I want to show him what twenty-three and a quarter is." We were going a fair twelve, which was about the car’s limit.
Our passenger swore something and then groaned.
"Hush, darling!" said Pyecroft, "or I’ll have to hug you."
The main road, white under the noon sun, lay broad before us, running north to Linghurst. We slowed and looked anxiously for a side track.
"And now," said I, "I want to see your authority."
"The badge of your ratin’," Pyecroft added.
"I’m a constable," he said, and kicked. Indeed, his boots would have bewrayed him across half a county’s plough ; but boots are not legal evidence.
"I want your authority," I repeated coldly; "some evidence that you are not a common, drunken tramp."
It was as I had expected. He had forgotten or mislaid his badge. He had neglected to learn the
