He had packed Jimmy in the breast of his coat and secured him with the strap from which the provisions had been slung. His way lay south, round the precipitous eaves of Soyland towards the falling moorland below. He moistened his finger to the fresh wind, dodged again to a spot whence he could see the bloodhounds, glanced at the rocks above him, and began to move from rock to rock, making all the cover he might. Now and then he murmured to Jimmy, who was restless with the shaking and close confinement. “Be a man, Jimmy,” he kept saying; “across to this big boulder now--now over this heather--we must keep an eye above us, too--good! We’ll double here; never do to cross that open space, eh, Jimmy?...” He made fair progress, and presently gave an “Ah!” of satisfaction. A path of slippery bents ran up from below among the rocks and heather, as a wave washes up a steep beach; unhesitatingly he crouched and crawled towards it. “Now hold tight for a slide, Jimmy!” he muttered. He lay flat on his back and started himself down the slippery way. His speed increased, and he clutched at heather roots to check himself, using his heel also as a brake. That was dangerous, for it lifted his whole body. The heather rocked and swept past him in a blur; he plunged dizzily downwards, jolted and breathless; and sixty yards down he clutched desperately at another bush and lifted twice clear over, his body taking a heather bush at each bound. He lay in a deep gutter between two purple clumps, scratched and bruised and panting, his body arched over the child; then he was up again. His first glance was at the rocky eaves; their line was sharp against the sky and unoccupied; and between himself and the men with the hounds he had now set a low roll of moorland. It was now he who must take a risk--the risk of a sentry appearing suddenly on the eaves. He ran twenty yards ahead, glanced up again at the grey rocks, ran forward again, and continued to run, his head constantly over his shoulder. Jimmy’s face puckered, and again Monjoy hushed him. “Ssh! Jimmy boy; we’ll manage yet, you and I; the farther south the less chance they have of rounding us--but not too far, Jimmy, or we shan’t catch those damned dogs. What fools they are to keep ’em leashed, Jimmy! They’re lazy rascals.... Now just a little farther----” The child became quiet again, and by and by a further fall of the land gave them a moment’s breathing-space. He was now far down in the valley, with nothing but the rolling heather about him. “Do you think this’ll do?” he said to the child; and again he moistened his finger to the wind. He drew out a pistol. He found a flat stone, knocked the priming from the pan, and began to work up a little tinder and tow with more powder from his flask. He set the stone down under the heather and drew the trigger over it.