n tipped out of the car, we shall find him rolling as a colt
rolls in a field, kicking his legs for fun."

"Clashing his hoofs," said the Professor. "The colts do, and so did
Pan."

"Pan again!" said Dr. Bull irritably. "You seem to think Pan is
everything."

"So he is," said the Professor, "in Greek. He means everything."

"Don't forget," said the Secretary, looking down, "that he also means
Panic."

Syme had stood without hearing any of the exclamations.

"It fell over there," he said shortly. "Let us follow it!"

Then he added with an indescribable gesture--

"Oh, if he has cheated us all by getting killed! It would be like one of
his larks."

He strode off towards the distant trees with a new energy, his rags
and ribbons fluttering in the wind. The others followed him in a more
footsore and dubious manner. And almost at the same moment all six men
realised that they were not alone in the little field.

Across the square of turf a tall man was advancing towards them, leaning
on a strange long staff like a sceptre. He was clad in a fine but
old-fashioned suit with knee-breeches; its colour was that shade between
blue, violet and grey which can be seen in certain shadows of the
woodland. His hair was whitish grey, and at the first glance, taken
along with his knee-breeches, looked as if it was powdered. His advance
was very quiet; but for the silver frost upon his head, he might have
been one to the shadows of the wood.

"Gentlemen," he said, "my master has a carriage waiting for you in the
road just by."

"Who is your master?" asked Syme, standing quite still.

"I was told you knew his name," said the man respectfully.

There was a silence, and then the Secretary said--

"Where is this carriage?"

"It has been waiting only a few moments," said the stranger. "My master
has only just come home."

Syme looked left and right upon the patch of green field in which
he found himself. The hedges were ordinary hedges, the trees seemed
ordinary trees; yet he felt like a man entrapped in fairyland.

He looked the mysterious ambassador up and down, but he could discover
nothing except that the man's coat was the exact colour of the purple
shadows, and that the man's face was the exact colour of the red and
brown and golden sky.

"Show us the place," Syme said briefly, and without a word the man in
the violet coat turned his back and walked towards a gap in the hedge,
which let in suddenly the light of a w