No pause might be ours yet, however. Stooping almost to the earth, we scurried up the slope, passed the cottage, and never stopped until we stood upon the road that skirts the base of the hill. A moment’s breathing space now and a moment’s reflection. Downward the winding road led straight to the bridge and the very figure we were flying. Yet it was necessary to cross the head of this road somehow, to reach the meadows that stretched over the lap of the low valley we must traverse before we could hit the Southampton highway. Fortunately no moon was up to play traitor to our need. I took my brother by the coat sleeve and led him onward. He was trembling and shivering as if with an ague. Over the grass, by way of the watery tracks, we sped--passing at a stone’s throw the pool where Modred had nearly met his death, breaking out at last, with a panting burst of relief, into the solitary stretch of road running southward. Before us, in the glimmering dark, it went silent and lonely between its moth-haunted hedges, and we took it with long strides. My brother hurried by my side without a word, subduing his breathing even as much as possible and walking with a light, springing motion on his toes; but now and again I saw him look back over his shoulder, with an awful expression of listening. It was after one of his turns that Jason suddenly whipped a hand upon my arm and drew me to a stop. “Listen!” he whispered, and slewed his head round, with a dry chirp in his throat. Faintly--very faintly, a step on the road behind us came to my ears. “He’s following!” murmured my brother, with a sort of despairing calmness. “Nonsense,” I said; “how do you know it’s he? It’s a public highway.” “I do know. Hark to the step!” It was a little nearer. There was a queer dragging sound in it. Was it possible that some demon inspired this terrible man to an awful species of clairvoyance? How otherwise could he be on our tracks? Unless, indeed, the splash had informed him! There was a gap in the hedge close by where we stood, and not far from it, in the field beyond, a haystack looming gigantic in the dark. With a rapid motion I dived, pulling Jason after me--and stooping low, we scurried for the shelter, and threw ourselves into the loose stuff lying on the further side of it. There, lying crushed into the litter, with what horror of emotion to one of us God alone may know, we heard the shuffling footsteps come rapidly up the road. As it neared the gap, my brother’s hand fell upon mine, with a convulsive clutch. It was stone cold and all clammy with the ooze of terror. As the footstep passed he relaxed his hold and seemed to collapse. I thought he had fainted, but mercifully I was mistaken. The step behind the hedge seemed to go a little further, then die out all at once. I thought he had passed beyond our hearing, and lay still some moments longer listening--listening, through the faint rustling sounds of the night, for assurance of our safety.