So saying, he walked off in the direction of the deserted village. Presently Brinkley rose and followed him, keeping him steadily in view. From time to time William Jones looked round, as if to see whether the other was coming; lingering when Brinkley lingered, hastening his pace when Brinkley hastened his. As an experiment, Brinkley turned and began walking back towards the cliffs. Glancing round over his shoulder, he saw William Jones had also turned, and was walking back. “Curious!” he reflected. “The innocent one is keeping me in view. I have a good mind to breathe him!” He struck off from the path, and hastened, running rather than walking, towards the sand-hills. So soon as he was certain that he was followed, he began to run in good earnest. To his delight, William began running too. He plunged among the sandhills, and was soon engaged busily running up and down them, hither and thither. From time to time he caught a glimpse of his pursuer. It was an exciting chase. When he had been engaged in it for half an hour, and was almost breathless himself, he suddenly paused in one of the deep hollows, threw himself down on his back, and lit a cigar. A few minutes afterwards, he heard a sound as of violent puffing and breathing, and the next instant William Jones, panting, gasping, perspiring at every pore, appeared above him. “How d’ye do, Mr. Jones?” he cried gaily. “Come and have a cigar!” Instead of replying, William Jones looked completely thunderstruck, and after glaring feebly down and muttering incoherently, disappeared as suddenly as he had come. Brinkley finished his cigar leisurely, and then strolled back to the caravan. CHAPTER IX.--THE SECRET OF THE CAVE. The young man of the caravan was now thoroughly convinced that one of two things must be true, either that William Jones had been instructed to keep a watch upon him, or that he, William Jones, had a secret of some sort which he was anxious not to have revealed. After both suppositions had been duly weighed, the second was accepted as the most likely; and it forthwith received the young man’s consideration. If there was a secret, he argued, it was in some way connected, firstly, with William Jones’s worldly prosperity; secondly, with the reports current of treasure hidden in times past among the sand-hills or the dangerous caverns of the sea. Was it possible, after all, that those reports were true, and that in some mysterious manner Jones had become acquainted with the hiding-place? It seemed very improbable for many reasons, one of the chief being the man’s extreme poverty, which appeared to touch the very edge of sheer starvation.