There came out of the interior a stifled sneeze, the first of an
uncontrollable paroxysm; another followed immediately on the heels of
it; and then the driver turned with an oath, laid the lash upon the
horses with so much energy that they found their heels again, and the
whole equipage fled down the road at a gallop.

At the first sound of the sneeze I had started back like a man shot. The
next moment a great light broke on my mind, and I understood. Here was
the secret of Fenn's trade: this was how he forwarded the escape of
prisoners, hawking them by night about the country in his covered cart.
There had been Frenchmen close to me; he who had just sneezed was my
countryman, my comrade, perhaps already my friend! I took to my heels in
pursuit. "Hold hard!" I shouted. "Stop! It's all right! Stop!" But the
driver only turned a white face on me for a moment, and redoubled his
efforts, bending forward, plying his whip and crying to his horses;
these lay themselves down to the gallop and beat the highway with flying
hoofs; and the cart bounded after them among the ruts and fled in a halo
of rain and spattering mud. But a minute since, and it had been
trundling along like a lame cow; and now it was off as though drawn by
Apollo's coursers. There is no telling what a man can do until you
frighten him!

It was as much as I could do myself, though I ran valiantly, to maintain
my distance; and that (since I knew my countrymen so near) was become a
chief point with me. A hundred yards farther on the cart whipped out of
the high-road into a lane embowered with leafless trees, and became lost
to view. When I saw it next the driver had increased his advantage
considerably, but all danger was at an end, and the horses had again
declined into a hobbling walk. Persuaded they could not escape me, I
took my time, and recovered my breath as I followed them.

Presently the lane twisted at right angles and showed me a gate and the
beginning of a gravel sweep; and a little after, as I continued to
advance, a red-brick house about seventy years old, in a fine style of
architecture, and presenting a front of many windows to a lawn and
garden. Behind, I could see outhouses and the peaked roofs of stacks;
and I judged that a manor-house had in some way declined to be the
residence of a tenant-farmer, careless alike of appearances and
substantial comfort. The marks of neglect were visible on every side, in
flower-bushes straggling beyond t