Consulting her watch, she sees it is nigh on half-past five. As the clock chimes that hour the girl leads the horse out into the mews, followed by Nero. Closing the stable door and locking it, she turns to her steed, and gathering the reins in her left hand puts her foot in the stirrup, and swings herself lightly on to his back. “Come on, Nero,” she calls again to the dog as she puts her horse into a trot and leaves the mews behind her. Her course is taken for Waterloo Station. None whose gaze fall upon her as she rides through the awakening streets, followed by her shaggy companion, would take her for what she is, a female detective in the employ of Mr. Trackem. But then a well-got-up detective ought to be unrecognisable, and Léonie, the handsome, gentlemanly youth to all appearance, _is_ well got up. On reaching Waterloo, Léonie sees to the boxing of her horse and dog. She elects, too, to travel with them in the horse-box as far as Bracknell, which place is reached at nine o’clock. Here the horse-box is run into a siding. Léonie loses no time, for she knows that every moment is precious. She sees to the unboxing of the horse, and before remounting him slips a shilling into the porter’s hand. “How far is ‘The Hut’ from here?” she inquires as she does so. “What, the Duke of Ravensdale’s Hut, sir? Oh, nigh on two miles. But there’s no one there, sir. It’s shut up; there’s only the forrester and his wife.” “Just, the persons I want to see. You mean of course——, there now, the name has quite slipped me,” exclaimed Léonie, with well-feigned appearance of annoyance at the name having just that moment escaped her memory. “Why, Miles Gripper, old Miles Gripper and his wife, sir,” puts in the porter, eager to supply the young gentleman’s defective memory. “They are well known to the country round, sir.” “Of course, of course; how stupid of me to forget!” answers Léonie briskly. “Well, now, my man, just tell me how I must frame for ‘The Hut.’” “Just cross that there bridge, sir,” explains the porter, pointing upwards, “and bear away down to the right. Keep straight on that road, sir, till you can’t go no further; there you’ll see a road going left and right. Take the right turn, sir, and after that the next right turn what ever is, and then stick to that road, and never mind any turns that you see, until you come to two cross-roads, the left one with a signboard directing to Aldershot. Don’t you go taking either of those two turns, sir, but ride on another fifty yards, and you’ll see a small wooden gate on the left. That leads to ‘The Hut’. It’s away in the forest.” “Thank you, my man,” says Léonie politely. “I think I understand. I go up over that, bridge, bear to the right, keep straight on till I must turn right or left, then take the right turn, and the very next that is, ride straight on until I reach the cross-roads, then about fifty yards further, where a gate on the left leads up to ‘The Hut.’ Is that it?