he spurs, and
leaning his head to the volleying of the rain he raced in a direction
opposite to that in which Haw-Haw Langley had disappeared, in a
direction that led as straight as the line of a flying bird towards that
cabin in the mountains.

Now and then the forefeet of his great horse smashed into a pool and
sent a muddy shower of rain flying up. It crackled against his slicker;
it beat like hands against his face. Everything was striving--all the
elements of wind and rain--to hold him back.

Yet flight brought a blessed sense of relief and of safety. He eased the
pace of his horse to a moderate gallop, and no longer driving blindly
through the hills, he made out, by peering into the blast of rain, some
of the pools which lay in his path, and swung aside to avoid them.

The rain lightened again about him; he caught a view of the kindly,
sheltering hills on all sides; but as he urged his horse on towards them
a shrill flight of whistling fell upon his ears from behind. He drew his
horse at once to a halt and listened with his heart knocking at his
teeth.

It was impossible, manifestly, that the fellow could have followed his
track through the rain. For that matter, if the wolf-fiend could follow
traces over a plain awash with water, why might they not as well follow
the tracks of Haw-Haw Langley? There was no good reason.

The whistling? Well, the whistler was far away in the heart of the
storm, and the sound was merely blown against the wind by a chance echo.
Yet he remained holding his rein taut, and listening with all his might.

It came again, suddenly as before, sharp, and keen as a shaft of light
in the blackest heart of night, and Mac Strann leaned over the pommel of
his saddle with a groan, and drove the spurs home. At the same instant
the rain shut in over the hills again; a fresher wind sprang up and
drove the downpour into his face. Also its roar shut out the possibility
of any sound reaching him from behind.

He was the worse for that. As long as the whistling might reach him he
could tell how near the pursuer rode; but in this common roar of the
rain the man might be at any distance behind him--on his very heels,
indeed. Ay, Dan Barry might rush upon him from behind. He had seen that
black stallion and he would never forget--those graceful, agile lines,
that generous breast, wide for infinite wind and the great heart. If the
stallion were exerted, it could overtake his own mount as if he were
st