e except
by the main door. I was almost despairing of escape from this prison of
mine, when I saw that the loft had a hayshoot, leading downwards. When
I saw it I fondly hoped that it led to some outer stable or cart-shed,
separated from that in which the carter slept. A glance down its smooth
shaft showed me that it led to the main stable. I could see the heads
of the meditative horses, bent over the empty mangers exactly as if they
were saying grace. Beyond them I saw the boots of the carter dangling
over the edge of the trusses of hay on which he slept. I stepped back
from this shaft quickly because I thought that I might be seen from
below. My foot went into the nest of a sitting hen, right on to the
creature's back. Up she started, giving me such a fright that I nearly
screamed. She flew with a cackling shriek which set all the blackbirds
chippering in the countryside. Round the loft she scattered, calling
her hideous noise. Up jumped the carter, down came his pitchfork with
a thud. His great boots clattered over the stable to the ladder. Clump,
clump, he came upstairs, with his pitchfork prongs gleaming over his
head like lanceheads. I saw his head show over the opening of the loft.
There was not a second to lose. His back of course was still towards me,
as the ladder was mercifully nailed to the wall. Before he turned I slid
over the mouth of the shaft down into the hayrack of the old brute who
had whinnied. I lit softly; but I certainly shocked that old mare's
feelings. In a second, before she had time to kick, I was outside her
stall, darting across the stable to the key, which lay on the truss of
hay, mercifully left there by its guardian. In another second the lock
had turned. I was outside, in the glorious open fields again. Swiftly
but silently I drew the key out of the lock. One second more sufficed
to lock that door from without. The carter was a prisoner there, locked
safely in with his horses. I was free. The key was in my pocket. Yonder
lay the great combes which hid Taunton from me. I waved my hat towards
them; then, with a wild joyous rush, I scrambled behind the cover of the
nearest hedge, along which I ran hard for nearly a quarter of a mile.

I stopped for a few minutes to rest among some ferns, while I debated
how to proceed. I changed the arrangement of my stockings; I also dusted
my very dirty clothes, all filthy from that horrid passage underground.
"Now," I said to myself, "there must be many