Death was tardy, and in two hours' time he was fainter, but as much alive to discomfort as before. Trudging on again, he knew not how, he came upon a deep, mossy lane, with primroses growing on its steep, high banks, and hare-bells drooping in the wind. Dick climbed, or rather rolled, down into the lane. Surely it would lead him to some dwelling, and every feeling was merged now into the desire for food. The stones and ruts cut his feet, and exhaustion made him dizzy. He slipped and fell; rose and stumbled on again twice. The third time he did not get up. It had ceased to seem worth while. It was getting dark and eerie, but he lay quite still. Half-starved always, one day of hard walking, absolutely without food, had been too much for Richard Chester. His last thought was of Giles. CHAPTER XI THE LADY DOROTHY BYNG The next traveller down the lane was a dog--a great black retriever with the most benevolent brown eyes. He came splashing down through the puddles, and overshot the mysterious heap by the roadside, though he sniffed something. Plunging back, he described a circle, with a suspicious stiffening of the tail, and smelt at Dick. "Boy" was his decision. "Strange, dirty boy; must be growled at." The dog growled accordingly, but the boy took no notice. Insufferable impertinence! With great indignation the dog lifted his nose and barked. At this point an old man in a gray livery suit, wrapped in a big cloak, came round the corner. "What's there, Lorry?" he asked, stopping. The dog, with every appearance of thirsting for Dick's blood, barked back that it was an orchard-robber, a stealer of chickens, a vagabond, a tramp. The old man pushed him aside, and, kneeling down, ran his fingers over Dick's bruised, bony little person. "Case o' starvation, Lorry, my friend," he observed. Lorry snorted, as if he knew different, and then he barked angrily, by way of discouraging the old servant still further. But the man shook his head, and lifted Dick out of the wet and muddy ditch. "My Lady would fair eat me if I left him here to die, Lorry," he said, and wrapped the boy in his cloak. Lorry eyed this move with contempt, and as the old man started down the lane carrying Dick in his arms, he rushed on ahead at a splashing canter and with an angry sway of the tail. He stated in a series of snapping barks that he was going on to tell someone what a very silly old man this was. With this amiable intention he found his way through a gate with stone pillars at the sides, up a broad avenue, to a door. Lorry barked for admittance, and made the steps as muddy as he could in the meantime. Presently the door opened a little, and a young lady looked out, reproachfully. "To the back-door, an' it please you!" she said severely. "Would you have the hall flags looking thus?" She pointed down at the muddy steps.