"This," said Lee, who, having left the group collected near the door, now stood beside a broad lattice, looking from a recess near the hearth into the garden, and commanding a view of the bridge. "It gives upon the bowling-green, and then down by the slope to the water. Out with you!" and unhasping the lattice pane as he spoke, he pushed it open. "Only, for your lives, step softly, softly!" and he placed his finger warningly on his lips. [Sidenote: What has become of it?] "This way," whispered Walcot, when, in less than three minutes' time, the whole party, including the limping Rumsey, stood out upon the velvet smooth turf On they crept, in single file, till they stood upon the edge of the shelf of tall bracken, where, stooping down, they dispersed along the bank close down by the water's brink. "'Twas just hereabouts," said Walcot in a loud whisper. "There! there! Stop a bit. No. Now I think on't, 'twas of course farther along--close by the barge." "Here! I have it!" cried one in a voice of smothered but gleeful triumph. "Alack! it was but the battered handle of an old tin pot;" and in dire vexation he dashed it down again. For a good half-hour the search was continued, until, wet through with their wadings and dabblings, some showed signs of giving in. Others swore they would not budge till they had found the missing thing. "Then I take it we may as well part company at once," yawned Lord Howard, "for it's washed away into mid-stream long before now, depend on it. Come, Master Lee, what say you? I'll dare swear you know something of the water's soundings hereabouts." "I think 'tis likely enough, my lord," answered Lawrence, catching Lord Howard's attack of yawning. "Then let it lie, and be hanged to it!" and the nobleman sauntered back up the slope. One or two of the party now proposed to return to the inn and proceed with the business which had brought them together; but Rumbold shook his head. "It is too late," he said: "three nights hence we will meet again." [Sidenote: An inhospitable landlord.] "Oh! but not here," piteously entreated Sheppard. "Not here, Master Rumbold; don't say it's to be here. I never should hear the last of it; I shouldn't indeed!" "Peace with thy craven tongue!" said the maltster with one of his grim smiles. "No, boys," he added, turning to the rest; "not here: yonder at my own house, where last we met, in the Warder's Room." And with a gesture of farewell he left them, while Lee betook himself home in his boat. The rest, not without bestowing a good many muttered left-hand compliments on the fumble-footed Rumsey, separated in much the same order as they had come,--some by the barge, which soon lost itself among the mists of the river, others making their way on foot by the Rye to Hoddesdon and the neighbourhood. It was, however, with difficulty that Colonel Walcot's companions could drag him from the bridge. [Sidenote: All dark.]