they reined up, straining
their ears at a rumbling sound borne up to them from the valley road
below--the sound (though they knew it not) of two cannon ploughing through
the mire towards Steens.

At eight o'clock next morning one of these guns opened fire, and with its
first shot ripped a breach through the courtlage wall. There came no
answer. When the Sheriff, taking courage, rode up to summon the house,
its garrison consisted of two women and one sleeping babe.

XVI.

Four days later the fugitives were climbing a slope on the south-eastern
fringe of Dartmoor. They mounted through a mist as dense almost as that
in which they had ridden forth--a cloud resting on the hill's shoulder.
But a very few yards above them the sky was blue, and to the south of
them, had their eyes been able to pierce the short screen of vapour, the
country lay clear for mile upon mile, away beyond Ashburton to Totnes, and
beyond Totnes to Dartmouth and the Channel.

Roger Stephen's face was yellow with disease and hunger; he could hardly
sit in his saddle. He panted, and beads stood out on his forehead as
though he felt every effort of his straining horse. Malachi's face was
white but expressionless. Life had never promised him much, and for him
the bitterness of death was easily passed.

By-and-by, as a waft of wind lifted the cloud's ragged edge, his eyes
sought the long slopes below, and then went up to a mass of dark granite
topping the white cumulus above, and frowning over it out of the blue.

"Better get down here," he said.

Roger rode on unheeding.

"Better get down here, master," he repeated in a wheedling voice, and,
dismounting, took Roger's rein. Roger obeyed at once, almost
automatically. As his feet felt earth he staggered, swayed, and dropped
forward into Malachi's arms.

"Surely! Surely!" the old man coaxed him, and took his arm. They left
their horses to graze, and mounted the slope, the old man holding the
younger's elbow, and supporting him. Each carried a gun slung at his
back.

They reached the foot of the tor, and found a granite stairway, rudely
cut, winding to its summit. Roger turned to Malachi with questioning
eyes, like a child's.

"Surely! Surely!" repeated Malachi, glancing behind him. His eye had
caught a glint of scarlet far down on the uncoloured slope.

With infinite labour and many pauses they climbed the stairway together,
the old man always supporting the younger and coaxin