Never for a moment did the slightest fear cross the smith’s mind that the notorious highwayman would stop Lady Patience’s coach. Still, a warning would not have come amiss. Perhaps it was not too late. The road wound in and out a good deal, skirting bogland or massive boulders. John hoped that on the path he might yet come across Jack o’ Lantern and his master, before they had met the coach. He started to run and had covered nearly a mile when suddenly he heard a shout, which made his honest heart almost stop in its beating, a shout, followed by two pistol shots in rapid succession. The shout had rung out clear and distinct in the fresh, lusty voice of Beau Brocade. "Stand and deliver!" John dared not think what the pistol shots had meant. With elbows now pressed to his sides, he began running at a wild gallop along the rough, unbeaten track, towards the point whence shots and shout had come. CHAPTER XVIII MOONLIGHT ON THE HEATH The jolting of the carriage along the quaggy road had been well nigh unendurable. Mistress Betty was groaning audibly. But Lady Patience, with her fair head resting against the cushions, was forgetting all bodily ailments, whilst absorbed in mental visions that flitted, swift and ever-changing, before her excited brain. There was the dear brother in peril of his life, his young face looking wan and anxious, then Sir Humphrey Challoner, the man she instinctively, unreasonably dreaded, and John Stich, the faithful retainer, brave and burly, guarding his lord’s life with his own. These faces and figures wandered ghostlike before her eyes, and then vanished, leaving before her mental vision but one form and face, a pair of merry, deep-set grey eyes, that at times looked so inexpressibly sad, a head crowned with a mass of unruly curls, a figure, lithe and active, sitting upon a chestnut horse and riding away towards the sunset. It was a pleasant picture: no wonder Patience allowed her mind to dwell on it, and in fancy to hear that full-toned voice either in lively song or gay repartee, or at times with that ring of tenderness in it, which had brought the tears of pity to her eyes. The hours sped slowly on, the cumbrous vehicle jostled onwards, plunging and creaking, whilst Thomas urged the burdened horses along. Suddenly a jerk, more vigorous than before, roused Patience from her half-wakeful dreams. The heavy coach had seemed to take a plunge on its side, there was fearful creaking, and much swearing from the driver’s box, a shout or two, panting efforts on the part of the horses, and finally the vehicle came to a complete standstill. Mistress Betty had started up in alarm. "Lud preserve us!" she shouted, putting a very sleepy head out of the carriage window, "what’s the matter now, Thomas?" "We be stuck in a quagmire," muttered the latter worthy, vainly trying to smother more forcible language, out of respect for her ladyship’s presence.