han he by weight, an obstacle almost insurmountable. But
his horse was good--Stokoe's horses _had_ to be good--and it knew its
master. Never hitherto had the pair refused any jump, and they were not
like to begin now. With a rush and a scramble, and the clatter of four
good feet against the stone coping, they were over; over and away,
galloping hard for the North Countrie, the free wind whistling past
their ears as they sped, Stokoe throwing up his arm and giving a
mocking cheer as each ineffective volley of musketry from the troops
spluttered behind him; and the great roan horse snatched at his bit, and
snorted with excitement.

Yes, that part of it was worth living for, and the blood danced in the
veins of horse and man while the chase lasted. But what of it when once
more the hills of Northumberland were regained, when the great moors
that lay grim and frowning under the dark November skies were again
beneath his horse's feet? It was a different matter then, for the hue
and cry was out, and the earths all stopped against this gallant fox.
Chesterwood was closed to him, no friend dared openly give him shelter.

"He had fled, had got clear away to France," was the story they gave
out. But Frank Stokoe all the time lay snug and safe in hiding, not so
very far from his own peel tower. And he was one of those who,
disguised--perhaps in his case not very effectually--ventured to London,
intent on bringing back the body of their chief, that it might lie at
rest in the grave where sleep the fathers of that noble race.

There, in London, Frank narrowly escaped being taken. As it chanced, at
that time an Italian bravo was earning for himself an unsavoury
notoriety by going about boastfully challenging all England to stand up
before him to prove who was the better man. He would mark his man, pick
a quarrel with him, and the result was always the same. The Italian's
trick of fence was deadly, his wrist a wrist of steel. None yet had been
able to stand long before him; not one had got inside his guard.

As he walked once near Leicester Field in the dusk of an evening,
Stokoe's great figure caught the eye of this little Italian, in whose
mind suddenly arose the irresistible longing to bring this huge bulk
toppling to earth. That would be something not unworth boasting
about--that he, a sort of eighteenth-century David, should slay this
modern Goliath.

No one had ever been able to complain that it was difficult to pick a
quar