"He'll make a fine chase for them, and should find his way back to Witley," said Martin as he crouched down in a ditch which divided the road from a wood. Cracking branches might have betrayed him had he entered the wood just then. Half a dozen horsemen passed him, galloping in pursuit, and when the sounds had died away, and he was convinced that no others followed, he crawled from the ditch and went straight before him into the wood. At a clearing he stopped and looked at the stars, then continued his way along a narrow track that went towards the south-west, in which direction lay Dorchester. He had no mind to enter the town as a prisoner, but he meant to reach it all the same, and as soon as possible. For an hour he pushed forward, and then came suddenly to the edge of a clearing of some size. He stopped. He saw nothing, he was not sure that he heard anything, but the air seemed to vibrate with some presence besides his own. Perhaps he had heard the low sound which the opening door of the hut made. "You're a dead man if you move," said a voice out of the darkness. Fairley started and made a step forward, but stopped in time. "I should know that voice. I am Martin Fairley." "Fairley!" Crosby hurried forward to meet him. "Have you been a prisoner in Dorchester?" Martin asked. "A prisoner! No." "The devil take that wench!" "What wench?" Crosby asked. "Give me something to drink and a mouthful of food. The story may be told in a few words, and then we must get to Dorchester." "Martin! Why? Surely she--" "Yes; she will be there within an hour or so. That is why we go to Dorchester to-night." CHAPTER XX SCARLET HANGINGS Barbara's prison was an old house in a narrow street of Dorchester, the ground floor of which had been turned into temporary barracks for soldiers and militiamen. The prisoner passed to rooms on the upper floor through a rough, gaping crowd, and in some faces pity shone through brutality for a moment. Something worse than death might await so fair a traitor. The rooms to which she was taken were sparsely furnished and rather dark, the windows looking out upon a blank wall, two rooms communicating, but with only a single entrance from the passage without. The most hopeful would have seen little prospect of escape, and the most spirited might wonder if depression could be successfully conquered in such surroundings. Half a dozen soldiers had followed them up the stairs, but only Watson, whose stentorian voice seemed to fit him to command a troop of ruffians, entered the room with them. "There are so many prisoners in Dorchester that we have to make shift to find room for them," he said, as though to make apology for the accommodation. "Indeed, I might be much worse lodged," Barbara answered. Harriet Payne looked round the rooms in dismay, but said nothing. "May I know what charge is brought against me?" asked Barbara.