Dr. Shelton was allowed to send a message back, and he handed Shen-si a copy of _Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush_ to take to Mrs. Shelton. This he had had in his saddle-bags when the robbers captured him. On the margins he had written daily messages to his wife. One of the last was: "I am tired to death; all I can say in my desolation is, 'Make Thy grace sufficient for me, O God.'" With the precious book Shen-si started back. [Illustration: A ROADSIDE LUNCHEON IN TIBET Dr. Shelton and his daughters at luncheon with a group of Tibetan friends.] Shen-si was not the only one who had determined to reach Dr. Shelton. One day Yang Tien-fu said to his prisoner: "The government has sent a messenger to me to say that my family is at the priest's house and that if I will send you there in exchange, my family will be given to me. I am almost afraid to trust them, for they do not keep their word as you do, but I am going to send you to the priest's house with a strong guard." Twenty of the robbers took Dr. Shelton to the priest's house. There Yang Tien-fu found only his wife and mother. "What do two women amount to?" he said angrily. "I can buy another wife as good as that one for a hundred dollars any time. Have them bring me my son." A contract was prepared promising Yang Tien-fu that if he would release Dr. Shelton, the Chinese government would give him pardon for himself and his men, make him an officer in the army, return all his family to him and give him the arms and ammunition for which he had asked. On the next day the contract was to be signed by him and by the Chinese governor. Late at night some of the men, who had been out watching, hurried to the chief. "The government has you in a trap," they said, "many troops of soldiers are stealing in quietly to surround you and capture you." Quickly Yang Tien-fu took both his family and Dr. Shelton, and at midnight they slipped out between the circles of soldiers, back to the mountains. Again began the long, hard journeys. Soon Yang Tien-fu saw that his prisoner was too weak to walk or even to sit on his mule, so he had a rough chair made for him. For thirty-seven hours they carried him, running as fast as they could, for the soldiers were following. One day the chief said: "The doctor is so sick and weak he can go no farther. Take him to the loft of that barn and hide him in the straw. Place four guards with him. If he dies, hide his body where no one will find it; if he gets well, send a messenger to me, and I will come for him." The men made a tunnel through the rice-straw to the back of the loft, digging out a space large enough for a bed for the doctor at the end. They took a brick out of the wall to make a small hole for a window. As they dragged their sick prisoner into his straw house, one of them said: "The 'big doctor' is the same as a dead man."