As Franz read those damning words, he knew in a second all was really up with him. Once they had tracked him so far, they must track him to St Valentin. Again the instinct of his race drove him back towards his native village, after a word or two interchanged with his friends at the post-office. Those simple country souls never dreamt in their hearts of suspecting their old comrade, Franz Lindner the _jäger_, who had come back unexpectedly, like Andreas and Linnet, of being the Karl von Forstemann of Vienna referred to in the announcement. But Franz knew it couldn’t be long before the police were on his track; and he turned and fled upwards to his old home at St Valentin, like a fox to its lair, or a rabbit to its burrow. All the way up the hill his soul seethed within him. He would sell his life dear, if the worst came to the worst; they should fight for it now before ever they took him. He had stopped at a shop at Zell to buy a _jäger’s_ knife, in place of the one he had left behind him at Monte Carlo, in the card-sharper’s body. He stuck it ostentatiously in the leather belt he had bought at Botzen to complete his costume; as he went on his way, he fingered it ever and anon with affectionate familiarity. Old moods came back to him; with his feather in his hat and his blade by his side, he felt himself once more a true Tyrolese Robbler. The thin veneer of Regent Street had dropped off as if by magic; when they wanted to arrest him, they should fight for it first; who would take him, must follow him like a fleet-footed chamois up the rocks behind St Valentin. And whoever came first should receive that good knife, plump, so, in his bosom, or plunge his own, if he could, into Franz’s. He would die like a man with his dagger in his hand. No rope or axe should ever finish the life of a free mountain _jäger_! Thus thinking to himself, at last he reached the inn. On the threshold, Cousin Fridolin met him, distinctly penitent. “Andreas knows you’re here, friend Franz,” he said, with a reluctant air. “I didn’t quite _tell_ him, but he guessed it, and wormed it out of me. He’s gone for a walk just now with Linnet—she’s grown such a fine lady. But there, I forgot; you’ve seen her in London.” “Yes; I’ve seen her in London,” Franz answered, half-dreamily, in a musing undertone. His voice was as the voice of a condemned criminal. He knew he was doomed. He knew he must die. It might be to-day, or it might be to-morrow; but, sooner or later, he felt sure, the police would be after him.