"Quick! draw your dark
wrap over your head and make for cover. That furze-bush over there! Get
behind it, and drop down, and I'll follow. From there, there is a chain
of bushes behind which we can make for the high-road at last. Quick! the
men are coming this way, some of them. And if we're caught...!"

Her face was fearless. She acted instantly upon his suggestion,
gathering her dark velvet cloak about her and pulling it up over her
face and head, and then sped out suddenly across the open space like a
fleet shadow, until a shaft of moonlight, penetrating through the
clouded sky, fell full upon her hurrying figure, etching it almost as
clearly as though it had been day.

Cleek sucked in his breath and, half-crouching, half-running, sped after
her. God! what if the men had seen! He glanced back quickly over his
shoulder, and then redoubled his pace. For, of a sudden, with the speed
of a lightning-flash every flare in that valley had gone out--zip!--like
that. Every voice had dropped to stillness, and the night was a hideous
thing of running footsteps, pelting, he knew only too well, up the
hillside after them--those watchers who had seen the secret of the
night, and to-morrow might give it forth to an unsuspecting world. Their
lives wouldn't be worth much if _this_ crew caught them, that was
certain.

Panting, he reached her side, caught hold of her elbow, and pinning it
close in his fingers hurried her forward, every faculty alert, every
nerve a-tremble. Her panting breath was like the breath of a spent
runner; she wouldn't last far in those high heels, he knew; the going
was too hard. It was only a matter of time now. The hurrying footsteps
seemed to be coming nearer and nearer.

He bent his face down to hers.

"The motor-car? Where?" he said in a quick, panting voice.

She managed to stammer out a reply, stumbling feet falling over the
rough ground, tripping in clumps of heather, bruising themselves against
harsh stones.

"In the lane--beyond--over there! I've been a fool--leave me and go
yourself!" she panted out in disjointed sentences that were ringing
with despair.

"Never! We'll get there yet. Gather up your skirts.... Gad! you're
done!" It was his own voice that spoke to her, and for a sudden moment
he had forgotten the part he played in the exigencies of this
distressing situation. He heard her gasp suddenly, send startled eyes up
into his face, and then sway against him, and realized his folly--too