e puzzled.

"That's the sound of horseshoes," said Gaydon.

"But there's another sound keeping pace with the horseshoes," said
Misset.

O'Toole leaned on their shoulders, crushing them both down upon the sill
of the window.

"It is very like the sound a gentleman makes when he reels home from a
tavern."

Gaydon and Misset raised themselves with a common effort springing from
a common thought and shot O'Toole back into the room.

"What if it is?" began Misset.

"He was never drunk in his life," said Gaydon.

"It's possible that he has reformed," said O'Toole; and the three men
precipitated themselves down the stairs.

The drunkard was Wogan; he was drunk with fatigue and sleeplessness and
pain, but he had retained just enough of his sober nature to spare a
tired mare who had that day served him well.

The first intimation he received that his friends were on the watch was
O'Toole's voice bawling down the street to him.

"Is it a lottery? Tell me we're all rich men," and he felt himself
grasped in O'Toole's arms.

"I'll tell you more wonderful things than that," stammered Wogan, "when
you have shown me the way to a stable."

"There's one at the back of the house," said Gaydon. "I'll take the
horse."

"No," said Wogan, stubbornly, and would not yield the bridle to Gaydon.

O'Toole nodded approval.

"There are two things," said he, "a man never trusts to his friends.
One's his horse; t' other's his wife."

Wogan suddenly stopped and looked at O'Toole. O'Toole answered the look
loftily.

"It is a little maxim of philosophy. I have others. They come to me in
the night."

Misset laughed. Wogan walked on to the stable. It was a long building,
and a light was still burning. Moreover, a groom was awake, for the door
was opened before they had come near enough to knock. There were twelve
stalls, of which nine were occupied, and three of the nine horses stood
ready saddled and bridled.

Wogan sat down upon a corn-bin and waited while his mare was groomed and
fed. The mare looked round once or twice in the midst of her meal,
twisting her neck as far as her halter allowed.

"I am not gone yet, my lady," said he, "take your time."

Wogan made a ghostly figure in the dim shadowy light. His face was of an
extraordinary pallor; his teeth chattered; his eyes burned. Gaydon
looked at him with concern and said to the groom, "You can take the
saddles off. We shall need no horses to-night."

The four men return