The grey smoke of their fire was still tangled in the willow-tops.

Colville drew up under the lee of the last house in the village.  He didn’t like the look of that open road.  Neither did I.

“Go on,” said Viola.  “What are you stopping for?”

The guns ceased firing for a moment and we rushed it.

“I do wish,” said Viola, “you’d tuck your arm in, Furny.  It’s your right arm and you’re on the wrong side of the car.”

I asked her what made her think of my right arm just then.

“Because it’s the only part of himself that Jimmy ever thinks of,” she said.

There was about three-quarters of a mile of causeway and it ended in a little hamlet.  And the hamlet—­it had been knocked to bits before we got into it—­the hamlet ended in a hillock of bricks and mortar.

The road to Zele was completely blocked.

“Well—­” said Colville, “I am blowed.”

“You’ve got to take it,” said Viola.

“Sorry, m’m.  It can’t be done.  You want a motor traction with caterpillar wheels for this business.”

He was backing the car when a shell burst and buried itself in the place where we had stood.

To my horror I saw that Viola had opened the door of the car and was getting out.

“What on earth are you doing?” I said.

“I’m going to walk to Zele.”

I pulled her back and held her down in her seat by main force.  She was horribly strong.  And as she struggled with me she said quietly, “It’s all right.  You two must go back and I must go to Jimmy.”

I shouted to Colville, “Turn her round, can’t you, and get out of this.”

He turned her.  He drew up deftly under the shelter of a barn that still stood intact.  Then he spoke.

“Are you quite sure, sir, that Mr. Jevons is in that place?  Because, sir, I heard Kendal say something this morning about their going to Antwerp.”

“Then why the devil didn’t you say so?”

“I didn’t think of it, sir, until I saw Mrs. Jevons getting out.”

He added by way of afterthought, “Besides, I promised Kendal.  You and Mrs. Jevons wasn’t to know he was going on to Antwerp.”

Viola and I looked at each other and burst out laughing.

Somewhere behind us from beyond the river a gun boomed and we took no notice of it.  We went on laughing.

“He’s had us again,” she said.

“Yes.  We’ve been done this time.  Well—­we’d better scoot.”

We made a rush for it between guns and got to Baerlere.  Once we were out of the village and heading for the Ghent road we were safe.

We were hardly out of sound of the guns when I heard Viola saying, “You know it really was funny of Jimmy.”

I said, “He won’t think it quite so funny when he hears what we’ve done.”

He didn’t think it funny at all.  He was furious when he heard what we’d done.  He forbade Viola to follow him again.  He threatened to sack Colville.  He said he’d have me sent home to-morrow and kept there, and Viola should go with me.