himself, he let go. Fortunately, the ground was
soft, for a garden adjoined the stable; but the shock was a heavy one,
and he lay for a minute or two without moving, having some doubt whether
he had not broken his neck. Then he got up, and listened.

Everything was still and quiet, and, indeed, his fall had been almost
noiseless. He rose to his feet, felt along the wall until he encountered
a low paling, climbed over it, and was in the road.

He had, when he jumped for the window, tied his boots to his back, and
now carried them in his hand. The night was very dark; but his eyes,
accustomed to the greater darkness of the stable, had no difficulty in
following the road. He walked slowly, for the exertion he had undergone
and the shock of the fall had drawn greatly from his small stock of
strength.

After going a quarter of a mile, he put on his boots, and, climbing a
wall of sods which bordered the road, struck across country. There were
no stars to guide him, and a slight mist had begun to fall. There was but
little wind, but this was sufficient to give a direction to the rain.
Walter noticed this, and at once struck out in a direction which kept the
rain falling upon the right side of his face; and he knew that, by so
continuing, he was going in a tolerably straight line. As near as he
could tell he walked for two hours, and then, utterly exhausted, lay down
on the lee side of a turf wall.

There was, as yet, no gleam of light in the sky, and in a very few
minutes he was again sound asleep. He woke up with a feeling of bitter
cold, and, on rising, found that his limbs were completely stiffened by
the wet. It was morning now, the wind had got up, and a driving rain shut
out the view on all sides. Walter stamped his feet and swung his arms for
some time to restore the circulation.

He had no idea in which direction he had been travelling, for he did not
know whether the road from which he had started ran north, south, east,
or west. He noticed that the wind had changed; for, whereas he had lain
down under the lee of the wall, it was now the weather side. He walked in
the same direction as before for two hours, and could then go no farther.
He had seen no signs of human habitation, and had not crossed a road or
even a footpath. Since starting in the morning he had passed no more
walls or fences, and, as far as his eye could reach through the driving
rain, nothing was to be seen save a desolate expanse of moor and bog.