"Good wit, my lady!" cried Guy, whose excitement had taken on the form of an exalted gayety. "Who rides with thee rides safe, my love--e'en as Theseus of old did ride, scathless 'neath the spell of protecting Pallas!" "Stuff!" said Phoebe, spurring again, with a smile. Guy led the way at once across country to the eastward, the soft English turf so deadening their hoof-beats that those behind them had no clue to their change of route. When the pursuing party reached the Bishopsgate, they met the watch and learned that no one had passed since the hue-and-cry was heard. "Here divide we, then," cried stout Sir Isaac Burton. "Let eight follow them around the wall, while I with other six ride on, that, if haply they have entered London by the Aldersgate, we may meet them within the city." The suggestion was adopted, and, all unconscious of their peril, the lovers were rapidly hemmed in between two bands of pursuers. Sir Guy and Phoebe reached the Aldersgate unmolested and were allowed to pass in without protest, as the hue-and-cry had not yet reached so far. They ambled quietly past the watch, arousing no suspicion, but no sooner had they turned the first corner than once more they urged their tired horses to greater exertion. "Choose we the side streets," said Guy. "Who knows what watch hath been set on Gracechurch Street. 'Tis for London Bridge we are bound, is't not?" "Yes," said Phoebe. "I pray no prying watch detain us ere we pass that way!" Picking their way through the dark and narrow streets at a pace necessarily much reduced, they slowly approached their goal, until at length, on emerging into New Fish Street, they discerned the towering walls of London Bridge. Here they reined in suddenly with one accord, for, plainly visible in the moonlight, a group of horsemen was gathered and there was borne to their ears the sturdy voice of Sir Isaac. "Hallo!" he cried. "There be riders in New Fish Street. See where they lurk in the shadow! What ho, there! Give a name! Stand forth there!" Sir Guy drew his sword. "'Tis time for steel to answer!" he laughed. "Nay--nay! Wait--wait!" said Phoebe, earnestly. "There must be other issue than in blood!" Two or three horsemen now detached themselves from the group near the bridge and cantered up New Fish Street. Sir Isaac was among them. "Are ye there, traitor?" he cried. "Where is my daughter?" Sir Guy was about to reply when Phoebe put her hand on his arm. "Hush!" she whispered. "Hearken!" Faint at first, but growing momentarily louder, there came the clear trilling of a mysterious bell. It floated out from the dark by-ways whence they had themselves just emerged, and something eerie and uncanny in its clamor brought a thrill of terror to the young knight's nerves for the first time. "Now, what in God's name--" he began.