ere were no marks of the roadster's tires visible.

"He left the road between this point and the last stop," murmured Henry.

He went back a hundred feet and searched. There were no tire marks.
Another hundred feet showed no prints in the dust. But the third
hundred revealed the wheel marks. "Ah!" said Henry, "he turned off
close by."

He set his wheel against the fence and went forward, following the
prints with his light, which he shaded carefully and held close to the
road. Within fifty feet the marks turned straight off to the left.
The car had passed from the highway through a gap in the fence, into an
open field. What the field was like Henry could only conjecture. He
dared not flash his light around to see.

He ran back and got his machine, then followed the wheel prints into
the field. They did not show readily on the grassy surface, and soon
he had lost them altogether. At first a sense of fear clutched at his
heart. He recalled his leader's words as to the dangerous nature of
this duty. Here he was in exactly the lonely situation his captain had
foreseen, by himself, and with no means of defense. The enemy he was
trailing had disappeared. He might be a mile distant or he might be
waiting for his pursuer, behind the nearest tree. Henry shivered with
fear and stood irresolute. But the feeling passed when he realized
that he had lost the trail, that his quarry had escaped him, that he
had failed his captain. A wave of remorse swept over him. The sense
of fear left him entirely, and he bent all his energies to the task of
finding the motor-car. He hid his wheel in a thicket that he might
work faster, pausing only to snatch from it the metal cane fastened to
the frame.

Cautiously he glided forward, crouching as he moved, and taking
advantage of every rock and bush he could see to screen himself. He
held his breath and listened. Now he crept forward a foot at a time.
Now he advanced swiftly for yards. He worked his way to the right and
the left. But nowhere could he see what he was searching for, and no
betraying sound came out of the thick blackness.

"It's no use," he said to himself bitterly, after he had searched for a
quarter of an hour. "I have lost him, and if I am not careful I'll
lose his message as well."

Near by he could dimly discern a tall stump. He ran over to it and on
it laid his map, a pencil, his electric torch, his knife, the wires
that he had been carrying in his