white-haired, apple-faced old boy, with sleepy eyes and a grey
moustache; stout, sedentary, and very innocent, of a type that may
often be found in France, but is still commoner in Catholic Germany.
Everything about him, his pipe, his pot of beer, his flowers, and his
beehive, suggested an ancestral peace; only when his visitors looked up
as they entered the inn-parlour, they saw the sword upon the wall.

The Colonel, who greeted the innkeeper as an old friend, passed rapidly
into the inn-parlour, and sat down ordering some ritual refreshment. The
military decision of his action interested Syme, who sat next to him,
and he took the opportunity when the old innkeeper had gone out of
satisfying his curiosity.

"May I ask you, Colonel," he said in a low voice, "why we have come
here?"

Colonel Ducroix smiled behind his bristly white moustache.

"For two reasons, sir," he said; "and I will give first, not the most
important, but the most utilitarian. We came here because this is the
only place within twenty miles in which we can get horses."

"Horses!" repeated Syme, looking up quickly.

"Yes," replied the other; "if you people are really to distance your
enemies it is horses or nothing for you, unless of course you have
bicycles and motor-cars in your pocket."

"And where do you advise us to make for?" asked Syme doubtfully.

"Beyond question," replied the Colonel, "you had better make all haste
to the police station beyond the town. My friend, whom I seconded under
somewhat deceptive circumstances, seems to me to exaggerate very
much the possibilities of a general rising; but even he would hardly
maintain, I suppose, that you were not safe with the gendarmes."

Syme nodded gravely; then he said abruptly--

"And your other reason for coming here?"

"My other reason for coming here," said Ducroix soberly, "is that it
is just as well to see a good man or two when one is possibly near to
death."

Syme looked up at the wall, and saw a crudely-painted and pathetic
religious picture. Then he said--

"You are right," and then almost immediately afterwards, "Has anyone
seen about the horses?"

"Yes," answered Ducroix, "you may be quite certain that I gave orders
the moment I came in. Those enemies of yours gave no impression of
hurry, but they were really moving wonderfully fast, like a well-trained
army. I had no idea that the anarchists had so much discipline. You have
not a moment to waste."

Almost as he spo