ss, and as the boat runs in connection with it, I
should think we have shaken him off very effectively."

"My dear Watson, you evidently did not realize my meaning when I said
that this man may be taken as being quite on the same intellectual plane
as myself. You do not imagine that if I were the pursuer I should allow
myself to be baffled by so slight an obstacle. Why, then, should you
think so meanly of him?"

"What will he do?"

"What I should do?"

"What would you do, then?"

"Engage a special."

"But it must be late."

"By no means. This train stops at Canterbury; and there is always at
least a quarter of an hour's delay at the boat. He will catch us there."

"One would think that we were the criminals. Let us have him arrested on
his arrival."

"It would be to ruin the work of three months. We should get the big
fish, but the smaller would dart right and left out of the net. On
Monday we should have them all. No, an arrest is inadmissible."

"What then?"

"We shall get out at Canterbury."

"And then?"

"Well, then we must make a cross-country journey to Newhaven, and so
over to Dieppe. Moriarty will again do what I should do. He will get on
to Paris, mark down our luggage, and wait for two days at the depot.
In the meantime we shall treat ourselves to a couple of carpet-bags,
encourage the manufactures of the countries through which we travel, and
make our way at our leisure into Switzerland, via Luxembourg and Basle."

At Canterbury, therefore, we alighted, only to find that we should have
to wait an hour before we could get a train to Newhaven.

I was still looking rather ruefully after the rapidly disappearing
luggage-van which contained my wardrobe, when Holmes pulled my sleeve
and pointed up the line.

"Already, you see," said he.

Far away, from among the Kentish woods there rose a thin spray of smoke.
A minute later a carriage and engine could be seen flying along the open
curve which leads to the station. We had hardly time to take our place
behind a pile of luggage when it passed with a rattle and a roar,
beating a blast of hot air into our faces.

"There he goes," said Holmes, as we watched the carriage swing and
rock over the points. "There are limits, you see, to our friend's
intelligence. It would have been a coup-de-maitre had he deduced what I
would deduce and acted accordingly."

"And what would he have done had he overtaken us?"

"There cannot be the least doubt that he