"Fate has not lost much time in forcing my hand!" I said to myself as I pushed my motor-cycle along the track towards the highroad. I thought it wiser not to look round, but just before I reached the road I glanced over my left shoulder, and there was the old woman crossing the fields at a much brisker pace than I should have given her credit for, and heading straight for the nearest farm. My hand was being forced with a vengeance. Instinctively I should liked to have turned uphill and got clear of this district immediately, but I was not sure how my cycle would behave itself, and dared not risk a stiff ascent to begin with. So I set off at top speed down the road I had come the night before, passing the old crone at a little distance off, and noticing more than one labourer in the fields or woman at a house door, staring with interest at this early morning rider. When the news had spread of where he had come from, and with what language he interlarded his speech, they might do something more than stare. There was a telegraph-office not at all far away. As I sped down that hill and swung round away from the sea at the foot, I did a heap of quick thinking. As things had turned out I dared not make for any place of concealment far off the highroads. Now that there was a probability of the hue and cry being raised, or at least of a look-out being kept for me, the chances of successfully slipping up the valley of some burn without any one's notice were enormously decreased. I had but to glance round at the openness of the countryside to realise that. No; on the highroads I could at least run away, but up in the moors I should be a mere trapped rat. Then I had the bright thought of touring in zigzag fashion round and round the island, stopping every here and there to address an inhabitant and leave a false clue, so as to confuse my possible pursuers. But what about my petrol? I might need every drop if I actually did come to be chased. So I gave up that scheme. Finally, I decided upon a plan which really seems to me now to be as promising as any I could think of. About the least likely place to look for me would be a few miles farther along the same road that ran past my last night's refuge, in the opposite direction from that in which people had seen me start. I resolved to make a detour and then work back to that road. I had arrived at this decision by the time I reached the scene of last night's mishap. Fortunately my cycle was running like a deer now, and I swept up the little slope in a few seconds and sped round the loch, opening up fresh vistas of round-topped heather hills and wide green or brown valleys every minute. At a lonely bit of the road I jumped off, studied my map afresh, and then dashed on again.