Crack--crack--crack went the guns blindly behind him, and the wild bullets whined among the branches. The horsemen plunged in after him, but were thrust back by the arms of the close-growing wide-spreading trees. They sprang from their horses and gave chase on foot. But Drexel, going at the best speed he could make in the knee-deep snow, weaving among the trees, stumbling often, scratching his face on the undergrowth, heard their voices grow fainter and fainter--and when he paused after half an hour, completely blown, he could hear no sound at all. For the time, at least, he was safe. CHAPTER XV THE MAN IN THE SHEEPSKIN COAT Drexel sank down in the fine snow, his back against a patriarch pine that rose without a branch far up towards the stars; and he sat there amid that vast white silence, breathing heavily, and considering what he should next do. He had to get back to St. Petersburg, and soon, else lose the prized chance of working on at Sonya’s side. But he dared not make straight for the railroad. The countess’s advice on that point he knew was sound; those bullets which had grazed him as he rolled in the snow were grim and indisputable evidence that the pursuit of him was a most serious matter. He thought of walking the fifty miles, of riding in a relay of sleighs hired from peasants; but he quickly realised that either method offered little if any chance of escaping the hundreds who would be sent out to scour the country for him, and his mind returned to the railroad. After all, he would go by train, and since he dared not go as Henry Drexel, he would go in the one disguise the country offered him. He would find a village, secretly buy peasant clothing, and ride back to St. Petersburg under the very nose of spies and police. This settled, he found the North Star, calculated the course he wished to follow through this unknown country, and set out. Now that the spur of pursuit was gone, he made but slow progress. Walking is not easy in a huge fur coat through unbroken snow a foot deep, and when your path is a series of semi-circles round wide, earth-sweeping hemlocks, and when every moment you have to set your course anew by a star. At length, however, he came out into the open. He was tired, but he kept on, heavily, doggedly. He was beginning to fear that he might walk on all night and find no village, having steered an accurate course between them all, when he saw in the distance a group of faint white mounds. Soon he was at the head of the village street, with its two lines of night-capped cottages. The village lay in universal silence; not a window winked with light. He determined to try the first cottage, and toward this he instinctively went on tip-toe, lest some slight noise should betray his presence to the village.