do something.'

Marjorie ran for her bridle and put it on Cheeky, who was cropping
grass by the stream.

'Go on,' shouted Allan; 'don't wait for us, we'll soon catch you up.
Let's go and catch Dewdrop and Daisy, Reggie; bicycles are no good for
the moors.'

In a short time Marjorie was overtaken by the two boys, perched upon
bridleless, bare-backed ponies.

The wind whistled past as they galloped over the level ground, and they
were almost too breathless to speak as they urged their ponies up the
slopes of the hill.

'Oh, gee up, Daisy; gee-up!' cried Allan, 'we have no time to lose
to-day!'

'Glad we got away all right,' he panted as they stood breathing their
ponies on the summit; 'it would never do to have these two dragging
about and asking questions. We've just got to get Neil out of there
before anything more happens,' he continued. 'The boat is waiting
about, watching for an opportunity to leave as soon as the _Heroic_
goes; and we must make Neil promise to leave with her.'

The sturdy little ponies descended the slopes with the sure-footedness
of cats; then sprang pluckily over the moss-hags which covered the
greater part of the peninsula.

Suddenly, without warning, they became entangled in a treacherous piece
of bog, from which they did not struggle into safety until Marjorie's
pony had lost a shoe.

'Look out,' cried Allan, as they were about to spring forward once
more; 'it's here that there are those holes that go down into the
caves, and you don't see them until you've nearly fallen into them.'

Curbing their impatience, they dismounted and walked, leading the
ponies by the bridle.

'There,' said Marjorie as they neared the cliff, 'the tide's rising,
and they're shaking out the sails on the smugglers' vessel.'

'Shall we all go down?' asked Reggie.

'No,' said Allan, 'the fewer the better. You stay here with the
ponies, and I'll go down with Marjorie.'

'Me?' said Marjorie, surprised.

'Yes, you. You've got to speak to him and get him to leave. Come
along.'

They lowered themselves over the edge of the cliff, and clambered to
the beach.

Two faces scowled at them over the bulwarks of the boat, and the
captain waiting on the shore, a man of foreign appearance, with a
shaggy black beard and a sou'-wester, glanced disapprovingly at
Marjorie.

Somewhat alarmed, she turned and discovered Duncan standing beside her.

The butler was more disturbed at the encounter than seemed to M