road for pleasure. Nor between the hostel and the
barrier was it probable that any sentinel would patrol the empty street.
At any rate I met nothing, except a market-cart coming in, the
occupants of which were too busy discussing the handling they had
received at the barrier to look under the shadow of the wall for a
vagrant boy.

At last I found a convenient place, where the road was dark as night,
and where a sharp turn made it likely that the horses would be taken
slowly past. Here I crouched, dripping from head to foot, for a long
ten minutes.

Then my heart beat as I heard the dull rumble of the wheels, and caught
the lurid glare of the two lamps coming. By the brief glance I got I
saw that the guard (as I had hoped) had crouched in for shelter under
the driver's hood, and that the sole occupant of the back _coupe_ was
buried under his tarpaulin.

Now was my time. I had carefully selected my point of attack. The two
baskets I spoke of underneath the coach swung on double iron bars, and
between the two, could I only scramble there, there was just room for me
to perch, completely hidden, at any rate while night lasted, from the
keenest of eyes.

I saw the driver throw himself back and pull in the reins for the
corner, and in the momentary check of the speed I darted out from my
hiding-place, and clambered in under the tail of the coach and reached
the bars between the baskets. But for Providence I should have fallen
between the wheels. As it was, the start forward of the horses carried
me dragging on my toes twenty yards before I could haul myself up and
lie face upwards across the bars, with my head on one basket, my feet on
the other, and my nose almost rubbing the bottom of the coach.

I have, I own, travelled many a mile more comfortably, but few more
happily. I had but one terror, and that was short-lived. At the
barrier the coach pulled up, and the guard got down to hand in his
papers, and to help himself to a spare wrapper out of the boot. Then,
with a cheerful "Hi! hi!" he clambered back to his place, the barrier
swung open, and we were out of Brest in the open country outside.

Little I cared that the mud plastered my back with a coat as thick as
that I had on. Little I cared that the drippings of the coach fell in
my mouth and eyes, and the stench of stale straw almost choked me. I
was free! The noose on the gallows would remain empty for me. I was so
gay I believe I even laughed under