lungs. But not for long. The dawn was creeping pale and
ghostly across the solid earth, and a faint fresh breeze was stirring
and driving the mist in wispy shrouds before it. If he lingered there he
might yet be found by some party of Royalist soldiers, and that would be
to undo all that he had done. He rose, and struck out across the peaty
ground. None knew the moors better than did he, and had he been with
Grey's horse that night, it is possible things had fared differently,
for he had proved a surer guide than did Godfrey, the spy.

At first he thought of making for Bridgwater and Lupton House. By now
Richard would be on his way thither with Ruth, and Wilding was in haste
that she should be reassured that he had not fallen to the muskets
of Wentworth's firing-party. But Bridgwater was far, and he began
to realize, now that all excitement was past, that he was utterly
exhausted. Next he thought of Scoresby Hall and his cousin Lord Gervase.
But he was by no means sure that he might count upon a welcome. Gervase
had shown no sympathy for Monmouth or his partisans, and whilst he would
hardly go so far as to refuse Mr. Wilding shelter, still Wilding felt an
aversion to seeking what might be grudged him. At last he bethought him
of home. Zoyland Chase was near at hand; but he had not been there since
his wedding-day, and in the mean time he knew that it had been used as
a barrack for the militia, and had no doubt that it had been wrecked and
plundered. Still, it must have walls and a roof, and that, for the time,
was all he craved, that he might rest awhile and recuperate his wasted
forces.

A half-hour later he dragged himself wearily up the avenue between the
elms--looking white as snow in the pale July dawn--to the clearing in
front of his house.

Desertion was stamped upon the face of it. Shattered windows and hanging
shutters everywhere. How wantonly they had wrecked it! It might have
been a church, and the militia a regiment of Cromwell's iconoclastic
Puritans. The door was locked, but going round he found a window--one
of the door--windows of his library hanging loose upon its hinges. He
pushed it wide, and entered with a heavy heart. Instantly something
stirred in a corner; a fierce growl was followed by a furious bark, and
a lithe brown body leapt from the greater into the lesser shadows to
attack the intruder. But at one word of his the hound checked suddenly,
crouched an instant, then with a queer, throaty sou