TWO con artists abandoned a 70-year-old man in the countryside in his slippers as they drove off with a car he was selling.

Eric Truby had taken the pair out on a test drive of his son's Toyota Land Cruiser 4x4, but they fled with the car after asking him to get out to check a noise coming from the rear of the vehicle.

Mr Truby, who has a heart condition and has a pacemaker fitted, said: "My feet had hardly touched the floor when they shot off like a bat out of hell with the door swinging in the wind.

"They left me there in my slippers with no money and no mobile phone and I had to flag down a passing car after a couple of minutes.

"Luckily someone stopped and it wasn't long before I was back with my wife, who immediately reported it to the police.

"The whole thing gave me a terrible shock."

Mr Truby's wife Rita, 68, said the couple knocked at the door after seeing the metallic green Toyota, registration number P208 KOO, for sale outside for £4,600.

She added: "Our son Dean lives in Devon, but he thought outside our house would be a good spot to sell the car because there is a lot of passing trade on the A44.

"When the couple called they were so nice and polite. When they asked Eric if they could go for a test drive we thought it would be all right.

"It all seemed to be very plausible.

"I took the woman's mobile number, and when I thought they had been gone for too long I tried the number and it was discontinued. Then I started to panic.

"The couple seemed nice but they were just confidence tricksters and we don't want this to happen to anyone else in Oxfordshire.

"When we told Dean what had happened he said, 'don't worry about it, the important thing is that you are fine', and sent us a big bunch of flowers."

Mr Truby added: "Before we set off, the couple agreed that we would just go a short distance, along Rutten Lane, but then they started going further, and when I asked them where we were going they said they wanted to test the car on a main road, so I thought 'fair enough'.

"But after a while I thought there might be something wrong, and when they stopped on the Islip road, just past the bridge that goes over the A34, I was getting really worried.

"When they asked me to get out of the car, I slid on to the ground in my slippers, and 'wham' off they went.

"I had a feeling they were going to take the car, but there was nothing I could do about it. Then I had to thumb a lift."

Mrs Truby said the man was aged about 40, with light grey hair, containing streaks of darker grey, and was wearing a polo shirt, possibly with a stripe in.

His female accomplice was slightly younger, with blond hair and protruding teeth.

She wore a white top, white three-quarter-length jeans and was carrying a grey-blue crescent-shaped handbag.

Oxford police spokesman Kate Smith said: "This couple took advantage of the gentleman's trust, and not only stole his car but left him miles from his home.

"These are extremely callous people to leave a man of his age stranded."