They
will have laid the hounds upon the boar's track. He will have broken
cover, and I shall not be there with my spear."

"We will go faster soon, sir," said Leoni encouragingly; but he did not
attempt to increase their speed, continuing at a walk and suddenly
drawing rein to speak to Denis.

"Saint Simon," he said--"I had forgotten him."

"Coming on about a hundred yards behind," whispered Denis. "He thinks
we are not followed."

"Hah!" exclaimed Leoni. "You ride on first. I will follow with the
Comte. He will take up all my attention now."

"Is he much hurt?" whispered Denis anxiously.

"No; an ugly cut to the bone, but nothing to fear. Forward, boy, and
keep a sharp look-out for the first road that bears off to the left.
That will be the way--anywhere will be right that takes us beyond
pursuit."

Denis obeyed and rode on, looking vainly for the road he sought, but
finding instead several leading in the opposite direction, while at
every turning he checked his horse to wait till the rest came up, for
their progress was necessarily slow.

The night glided drearily on, with the paces of the horses at a slow
walk growing monotonous in the extreme; and for some time past the
excitement of the flight had been giving place to the first approaches
of a drowsiness that was rapidly becoming invincible, when with a faint
cry of joy the lad noticed, as he looked off to his right, that the
faint soft light was beginning to appear in the east, becoming soon a
long, low pearly band which grew broader and broader, while the stars
that had brightened for a time when the moon went down began to pale.

The patches of woodland back from the road, which had been black and
sombre, began to turn grey, leaves grew distinct, and before long
high-up in the zenith the sky was flecked with a few tiny clouds of a
soft rosy orange which gradually brightened till they glowed like fire,
and then died out, leaving nothing but the clear sky, darkened in the
west, but growing lighter till the eastern horizon was reached, where,
plain to see, were the rapid advances of the coming day.

The birds, too, were beginning to make their pipings heard, and all at
once, as if wakened by the footsteps of the horses, a lark sprang up, to
begin circling round higher and higher, carolling its joyous song, and
with it raising the spirits of the young esquire, as he felt that they
were free once more, and at all events taking the first steps homewa