She tried to think logically.  Had he been pursuing the motor-car all the way from Birmingham?  Obviously he had not, since according to Aguilar he had been in the vicinity of Moze since the previous morning.  Hence he did not know that Audrey was involved in the Blue City affair, and he did not know that Jane Foley was at Frinton.  How he had learnt that Audrey belonged to Moze, and why and what he had come to investigate at Moze, she could not guess.  Nor did these problems appear to her to have an importance at all equal to the importance of hiding from the detective that she had been staying at Frinton.  If he followed her to Frinton he would inevitably discover that Jane Foley was at Frinton, and the sequel would be more imprisonment for Jane.  Therefore Audrey must not return to Frinton.  Having by a masterly process of ratiocination reached this conclusion, she began to think rather better of herself, and ceased blushing.

“Aguilar,” she demanded excitedly, having gone back through the plantation.  “Did Miss Ingate happen to say where I was staying last night?”

“No, madam.”

“I must run into the house and write a note to her, and you must take it down instantly.”  In her mind she framed the note, which was to condemn Miss Ingate to the torture of complete and everlasting silence about the episode at the Blue City and the flight eastwards.

CHAPTER XXIX

FLIGHT

“Fast, madam, did you say?” asked the chauffeur, bending his head back from the wheel as the car left the gates of Flank Hall.

“Fast.”

“The Colchester road?”

“Yes.”

“It’s really just as quick to take the Frinton road for Colchester—­it’s so much straighter.”

“No, no, no!  On no account.  Don’t go near Frinton.”

Audrey leaned back in the car.  And as speed increased the magnificence of the morning again had its effect on her.  The adventure pleased her far more than the perils of it, either for herself or for other people, frightened her.  She knew that she was doing a very strange thing in thus leaving the Spatts and her luggage without a word of explanation before breakfast; but she did not care.  She knew that for some reason which she did not comprehend the police were after her, as they had been after nearly all the great ones of the movement; but she did not care.  She was alive in the rushing car amid the magnificence of the morning.  Musa sat next to her.  She had more or less incompletely explained the situation to him—­it was not necessary to tell everything to a boy who depended upon you absolutely for his highest welfare—­such boys must accept, thankfully, what they received.  And Musa had indeed done so.  He appeared to be quite happy and without anxieties.  That was the worst He had wanted to be with her, and he was with her, and he cared for nothing else.  He had no interest in what might happen next.  He yielded himself utterly to the enjoyment of her presence and of the magnificent morning.