as the ladder was mercifully nailed to the wall. Before he turned I slid over the mouth of the shaft down into the hayrack of the old brute who had whinnied. I lit softly; but I certainly shocked that old mare's feelings. In a second, before she had time to kick, I was outside her stall, darting across the stable to the key, which lay on the truss of hay, mercifully left there by its guardian. In another second the lock had turned. I was outside, in the glorious open fields again. Swiftly but silently I drew the key out of the lock. One second more sufficed to lock that door from without. The carter was a prisoner there, locked safely in with his horses. I was free. The key was in my pocket. Yonder lay the great combes which hid Taunton from me. I waved my hat towards them; then, with a wild joyous rush, I scrambled behind the cover of the nearest hedge, along which I ran hard for nearly a quarter of a mile. I stopped for a few minutes to rest among some ferns, while I debated how to proceed. I changed the arrangement of my stockings; I also dusted my very dirty clothes, all filthy from that horrid passage underground. “Now,” I said to myself, “there must be many ways to Taunton. One way, I know, leads along this valley, past Chard there, where the houses are. The other way must lie across these combes, high up. Which way shall I choose, I wonder?” A moment's thought showed me that the combes would be unfrequented, while the valley road, being the easy road, which (as I knew) the Duke's army had chosen, would no doubt be full of people, some of them (perhaps) the King's soldiers, coming up from Bridport. If I went by that road my pursuers would soon hear of me, even if I managed to get past the watchers on the road. On the other hand, Aurelia would probably know that I should choose the combe road. Still, even if she sent out mounted men, she would find me hard to track, since the combes were lonely, so lonely that for hours together you can walk there without meeting anybody. There would be plentiful cover among the combes in case I wished to lie low. Besides, I had a famous start, a five hours' start; for I should not be missed until eight o'clock. It could not then have been much more than half-past two. In five hours an active boy, even if he knew not the road, might put some half a dozen miles behind him. I say only half a dozen miles, because the roads were the roughest of rough mud-tracks, still soft from the rains. As I did not know the way, I knew that I might count on going wrong, taking wrong turns, etc. As I wished to avoid people, I counted on travelling most of the way across country, trusting to luck to find my way among the fields. So that, although in five hours I should travel perhaps ten or twelve miles, I could not count on getting more than six miles towards Taunton. CHAPTER XXIII. FREE