rd for the night. A double rope ran through the pulley at its
end and had been hitched back over the iron winch which worked it.
We pushed the derrick out over the lane and I manned the winch
handle, while Master Archie caught hold of the hook and pulley at the
end of the double line. Checking the handle with all my strength I
lowered him as noiselessly as I could. As his feet touched the
cobbles below he let go and, without a thought of my safety, made off
down the lane.

I tugged the derrick inboard and recaptured the rope; cogged the
winch, swung out, dropped hand over hand into the lane, and raced up
it with all the terrors of the law at my heels.

CHAPTER VIII.

POOR TOM BOWLING.

Master Archibald's advice to me--to escape down to the water-side and
conceal myself on shipboard--though acute enough in its way, took no
account of certain difficulties none the less real because a soldier
would naturally overlook them. To hide in a ship's hold you must
first get on board of her unobserved, which in broad daylight is next
to impossible. Moreover, to reach Cattewater I must either fetch a
circuit through purlieus where every householder knew me and every
urchin was a nodding acquaintance, or make a straight dash close by
the spot where by this time Mr. Trapp would be getting anxious--if
indeed Southside Street and the Barbican were not already resounding
with the hue and cry. No: if friendly vessel were to receive and
hide me, she lay far off, across the heart of the town, amid the
shipping of the Dock. Yonder, too, Miss Plinlimmon resided.

If you think it absurd that my thoughts turned to her, whose weak
arms could certainly shield no one from the clutches of the law, I
beg you to remember my age, and that I had never known another
protector. She, at least, would hear me and never doubt my
innocence. She must hear, too, of Archie's danger.

That to reach her, even if I eluded pursuit to the Hospital gate, I
must run the gauntlet of Mr. George--who would assuredly ask
questions--and possibly of Mr. Scougall, scarcely occurred to me.
To reach her--to sob out my story in her arms and hear her voice
soothing me--this only I desired for the moment; and it seemed that
if I could only hear her voice speaking, I might wake and feel these
horrors dissolve like an evil dream. Meanwhile I ran.

But at the end of a lane leading into Treville Street, and as I leapt
aside to avoid colliding with the hind-whe