s the moor from the town to the
village--or the opposite, as you might say. Now then, look here--a bit
this way."

He preceded them along the narrow track until, on an open space in the
moorland, they came to one of the old lead-mine shafts, the mouth of
which had been fenced in by a roughly built wall of stone gathered from
its immediate surroundings. In this wall, extending from its parapet to
the ground, was a wide gap: the stones which had been displaced to make
it had disappeared into the cavernous opening.

"Now then!" said the tinker, turning on his companions with the
inquiring look of a man who advances a theory which may or may not be
accepted as reasonable, "you see that? What I'd like to know is--is that
a recently made gap? It's difficult to tell. If this bit of a stone
fence had been built with mortar, one could have told. But it's never
had mortar or lime in it!--it's just rough masonry, as you see--stones
picked up off the moor, like all these fences round the old shafts.
But--there's the gap right enough! Do you know what I'm thinking?"

"No!" murmured Betty, with a glance of fear and doubt at the black vista
which she saw through the gap. "But--don't be afraid to speak."

"I'm thinking this," continued the tinker: "Supposing a man was
following this track from Ellersdeane to Scarnham, or t'other way about,
as it might be--supposing he was curious to look down one of these old
shafts--supposing he looked down this one, which stands, as you see, not
two yards off the very track he was following--supposing he leaned his
weight on this rotten bit of fencing--supposing it gave way? What?"

Neale, who had been listening intently, made a movement as if to lay his
hand on the grey stones. Betty seized him impulsively.

"Don't, Wallie!" she exclaimed. "That frightens me!"

Creasy lifted his foot and pressed it against the stones at one edge of
the gap. Before even that slight pressure three or four blocks gave way
and dropped inward--the sound of their fall came dully from the depths
beneath.

"You see," said the tinker, "it's possible. It might be. And--as you can
tell from the time it takes a stone to drop--it's a long way down there.
They're very deep, these old mines."

Neale turned from the broken wall and looked narrowly at the ground
about it.

"I don't see any signs of anybody being about here recently," he
remarked. "There are no footmarks."

"There couldn't be, mister," said Creasy. "You