look
round, but there was nothing visible, though the boy felt sure that the
thrower must be Pete Warboys hidden somewhere among the trees. Then he
felt sure of it, for, glancing toward the clumps of furze in the more
open part, another well-aimed stone came and struck the road between the
wheels of the bath-chair.

"Is that some one throwing at me?" cried Uncle James angrily.

"No, uncle," said Tom, as he leaned upon the handle at the back of the
chair; "I expect they're meant for me--I'm sure of it now," he added,
for there was a slight rap upon his elbow, making him wince as he turned
sharply.

"The scoundrel! Whoever it is I'll have a policeman to him."

"Yes; there: it is Pete Warboys," cried Tom excitedly. "I saw him dodge
out from behind one of the trees to throw. Oh, I say, did that hit you,
uncle?"

"No, boy, only brushed the cushion. The dog! The scoundrel! He--Stop,
don't go and leave me here."

Tom did not, for, acting on the impulse of the moment, as he saw Pete
run out to hurl another stone, he wrenched himself round, unconsciously
giving the chair a start, and ran off into the wood in chase of the
insolent young poacher, who turned and fled.

No: Tom Blount did not leave his uncle there, for the chair began to run
gently on upon its light wire wheels, then faster and faster, down the
long hill slope, always gathering speed, till at last it was in full
career, with the invalid sitting bolt upright, thoroughly unnerved, and
trying with trembling hands to guide its front wheel so as to keep it in
the centre of the road. Farther back the land had been soft, and to
Tom's cost as motive power; but more on the hill slope the soft sand had
been washed away by many rains, and left the road hard, so that the
three-wheeled chair ran with increasing speed, jolting, bounding, and at
times seeming as if it must turn over. There, straight before the
rider, was the spot below where the road forked, the main going on to
the ford, that to the left, deep in sand, diving down into the large
sand-pit, which had been dug at from time beyond the oldest traditions
of the village. A kind of ridge had here been kept up, to form the
roadway right down into the bottom--a cruel place for horses dragging
cartloads of the heavy material--and from this ridge on either side
there was a stiff slope down to where the level of the huge pit spread,
quite a couple of hundred feet below the roadway straight onward to the
fo