Sara leaned back in silence at his side, conscious of a feeling of utter lassitude.  In spite of her anxiety about Molly, a curious contentment had stolen over her.  The long strain of the past weeks had ended—­ended in the knowledge that Garth loved her, and nothing else seemed to matter very much.  Moreover, she was physically exhausted.  Her fall had shaken her badly, and she wanted nothing better than to lie back quietly against the padded cushions of the car, lulled by the rhythmic throb of the engine, and glide on through the night indefinitely, knowing that Garth was there, close to her, all the time.

Presently her quiet, even breathing told that she slept, and Garth, stooping over her to make sure, accelerated the speed, and soon the car shot forward through the darkness at a pace which none but a driver very certain of his skill would have dared to attempt.

When, an hour later, Sara awoke, she felt amazingly refreshed.  Only a slight headache remained to remind her of her recent accident.

“Where are we?” she asked eagerly.  “How long have I been asleep?”

“Feeling better?” queried Garth, reassured by the stronger note in her voice.

“Quite all right, thanks.  But tell me where we are?”

“Nearly at our journey’s end, I take it,” he replied grimly, suddenly slackening speed.  “There’s a stationary car ahead there on the left, do you see?  That will be our friends, I expect, held up by petrol shortage, thanks to Jim Brady.”

Sara peered ahead, and on the edge of the broad ribbon of light that stretched in front of them she could discern a big car, drawn up to one side of the road, its headlights shut off, its side-lights glimmering warningly against its dark bulk.

Exactly as they drew level with it, Garth pulled up to a standstill.  Then a muttered curse escaped him, and simultaneously Sara gave vent to an exclamation of dismay.  The car was empty.

Garth sprang out and flashed a lamp over the derelict.

“Yes,” he said, “that’s Kent’s car right enough.”

Sara’s heart sank.

“What can have become of them?” she exclaimed.  She glanced round her as though she half suspected that Kent and Molly might be hiding by the roadside.

Meanwhile Garth had peered into the tank and was examining the petrol cans stowed away in the back of the deserted car.

“Run dry!” he announced, coming back to his own car.  “That’s what has happened.”

“And what can we do now?” asked Sara despondently.

He laughed a little.

“Faint heart!” he chided.  “What can we do now?  Why, ask ourselves what Kent would naturally have done when he found himself landed high and dry?”

“I don’t know what he could do—­in the middle of nowhere?” she answered doubtfully.

“Only we don’t happen to be in the middle of nowhere!  We’re just about a couple of miles from a market town where abides a nice little inn whence petrol can be obtained.  Kent and Miss Molly have doubtless trudged there on foot, and wakened up mine host, and they’ll hire a trap and drive back with a fresh supply of oil.  By Jove!”—­with a grim laugh—­“How Kent must have cursed when he discovered the trick Brady played on him!”