“I’ll trade for your loaded club. You’re the best shot of us, Professor. Please stay here and guard the girls. Ev, you go to the west along that ridge and keep a sharp lookout. Don’t let him get near enough to throw his knife, but draw him that way if you can. Mr. Johnston, take the east. Don’t shoot unless he attacks you or I call for help. I’ll go down the ravine and stop him.” Dolly Ravenden started forward. “Oh, please!” she said tremulously. “Not without a pistol. Oh, Dick!” “I will be careful,” he said gently, and leaning toward her for the briefest moment: “My darling, oh, my darling!” Then he was gone. With a business-like air Professor Ravenden examined the weapon Dick had given him, and placed himself in front of the girls. To the east they could see Johnston’s sturdy form, and westward Helga’s brooding eyes now and again glimpsed the buoyant figure of her lover. “Don’t be afraid, dearest,” he had called back to her. “When it comes to running I can do just as well as the next fellow, and generally better.” Shadows and patches of oak covered Dick’s course. Five minutes passed, and then came a shout from Johnston. Professor Ravenden walked coolly forward a few paces, raising and lowering his pistol arm as if to make sure that it was well oiled at the joints. At rest it pointed in the direction of Whalley. The juggler was running toward them from the side of the ravine down which Dick had moved. Taking advantage of the land’s broken contour, he had eluded and passed Dick; now he was making straight for them. “Stand!” called the professor. It was as if he had not spoken. The juggler approached with no lessening of pace, no swerve from his course. “Don’t come any farther. Do you want to be shot?” This time it was Helga’s voice. Whalley checked his rush. His hands clutched at his breast; he strove for utterance against an agonised exhaustion. His arms beating out into the air expressed with shocking vividness a warning of extremest terror. Obviously there was nothing to fear from the man in this mood. Nevertheless, Professor Ravenden held his pistol ready as he went forward. “Take—her—away!” he hacked out like a man fighting for utterance in the last stage of strangulation. “Eet—comes. I—haf—seen—eet!” “Compose yourself, my man,” soothed the professor. “Be calm and explain what has so alarmed you.” But the juggler only flung up his arms in a wild gesture toward the sky, and dropped. “We must call in the others,” said Professor Ravenden. Helga lifted her head and sent her clear and beautiful call rolling across the hills. At the sound the juggler crawled to her feet and brokenly begged her to keep silence. Before they could win an explantation from him Everard’s tall figure came speeding down the hillside, and only half a minute later Dick’s great bulk toiled up through the ravine. Johnston came in last. No sooner had Dick set eyes on the juggler than he advanced upon him.