In fact, down the High Street, the blue Morris they had seemed to watch for so long was at length leaving the kerb and gliding into the stream of traffic flowing towards them. But at once, taking advantage of a gap, it began to turn. Sergeant Webley got into gear, and the police car took off in pursuit.
The Morris completed its turn and moved slowly south down the High Street. On account of the traffic, and the crowd on the opposite pavement, the pursuers could not at once confirm their supposition that the blue car was also following somebody. Then Mr. Tuke touched the Sergeant’s arm and pointed. A figure in W.V.S. uniform was walking smartly along in the same direction.
The slow progress of the two cars provoked angry blasts from the horns of following vehicles. At the narrow bridge over the Ouse the usual congestion slowed everybody down; and Mrs. Shearsby—there was no doubt now as to her identity —forged ahead. Once over the bridge she suddenly crossed the street, dodging actively through the traffic and under the very bonnet of the Morris, and took the road to Gardington and Sandy, which was also the way to Burnside Avenue. The traffic thinned, the Morris fell back a little, and the police car followed suit.
A few minutes later Mrs. Shearsby turned into Burnside Avenue. Sergeant Webley was keeping well behind, for in these quiet roads there were no other cars in sight. Then, as the Morris turned after the green-clad figure, he shot ahead, crossed the Avenue, turned in the side street beyond, and pulled up.
“Perhaps you’ll wait here, sir,” he said to Mr. Tuke. “I’ll have a look from the corner.”
CHAPTER XVIII
MR. TUKE looked at his watch. The time was 3.25. The checking of clothing at the W.V.S. headquarters had perhaps been postponed: Lilian Shearsby, at any rate had not stayed there long, for which her late visitor was duly grateful. He had begun to feel the need of a little action.
It was impossible to tell, from Sergeant Webley’s back, as he stood at the corner of Burnside Avenue and peered circumspectly down it, what developments were taking place there. Mrs. Shearsby should by now have reached ‘Aylwyn- stowe.’ Harvey lighted a fresh cigar, and again noted the time. Ten minutes had passed. A few people had come by, mostly women. They showed no interest in these proceedings. It was warm in the car, and he had sat up late the night before. He began to feel a little sleepy.
He had closed his eyes when the sound of running footsteps roused him. The sergeant climbed into his seat.
“They’re off again,” he said.
It was ten minutes to four. The sergeant nosed the car to the corner of Burnside Avenue. At the far end of that prim thoroughfare the blue Morris was receding at a smart speed. The police car turned after it.
“Him in the check coat,” said Sergeant Webley, “went in right on her heels. He’s just come out again.”
The Morris had turned out of sight. The sergeant pressed the accelerator, and they shot down the Avenue, past Aylwyn- stowe and Nid D’Amour and Number Seventeen and the rest. There was no sign of the Morris in the cross street at the end, but the Sergeant turned right and then they were in the Gardington road, and an instant’s pause showed them their quarry heading for Sandy and Potton and Cambridge. It had a lead of a quarter of a mile. There was some traffic here, but Sergeant Webley kept his distance. The police car, he explained, had a more powerful engine than its apparent rating implied. Unless the Morris was equally deceptive, he could overhaul it whenever he chose.
They were retracing the route by which Mr. Tuke had come that morning. The laboratories of Imperial Sansil flashed by, and then they were passing the Gardington hangars. The two cars had worked up to a steady forty-five. The woods of Moggerhanger went past, and as they came into Sandy the Sergeant closed the gap to a couple of hundred yards. They mounted the abrupt gravelly ridge from which Sandy takes its name, and swept down into Potton. Here the Morris turned right, for Wrestlingworth, and the sergeant nodded.
“Cambridge,” he said.
It was at Wrestlingworth that Mr. Tuke had come out into this road from Stocking that morning. An almost straight run through Tadlow brought them to the Huntingdon road, which he had crossed a little lower down: and once over this; they were reversing his route again, by Wimpole to Barton. A pale blink of sunlight was showing, and a squadron of great bombers, heading south, trailed their swift shadows over the flat fields. The pinnacles of Cambridge, the spires of King’s and the ugly tower of the new library, rose against the skyline.
Sergeant Webley, who had dropped back, began to overhaul the Morris once more as the road curved beyond Barton into a fringe of new houses.
They passed the final bus stop in Barton road at half-past four. The Morris kept straight on to Fen Causeway. As it approached Trumpington Street the police car closed in, but a covered army truck, racing up, cut in between pursuer and pursued, and the sergeant swore. The three vehicles crossed Trumpington Street nose to tail, into Lensfield Road and Gonville Place. The Sergeant tried to pull out past the truck as they reached the end of Parker’s Piece, but oncoming traffic forced him to drop back. He tried again, saw the Morris turning left, and again had to fall behind the truck to follow. When the Morris was in sight once more it was taking a corner to the right, on its brakes, for it was travelling fast. The police car swung after it. They were in a maze of small streets, and the Morris was skidding round yet another corner. Again the sergeant wrenched at
