k?'

'Coming, sir, he is coming,' the man answered, to soothe him; and
remained where he was. Sir George was so shaken that he could not yet
stand alone, and the servant did not know what to think. 'Are you sure
you are not hurt, sir?' he continued anxiously.

'No, no! And Mr. Dunborough? Is he behind?'

'He rode on after them, sir.'

'Rode on after them?'

'Yes, sir, he did not stop.'

'He has gone on--after them?' Sir George cried.

'But--' and with that it flashed on him, and on the servant, and on Mr.
Fishwick, who had just jogged up and dismounted, what had happened. The
carriage and Julia--Julia still in the hands of her captors--were gone.
And with them was gone Mr. Dunborough! Gone far out of hearing; for as
the three stood together in the blackness of the trees, unable to see
one another's faces, the night was silent round them. The rattle of
wheels, the hoof-beats of horses had died away in the distance.

CHAPTER XX

THE EMPTY POST-CHAISE

It was one of those positions which try a man to the uttermost; and it
was to Sir George's credit that, duped and defeated, astonishingly
tricked in the moment of success, and physically shaken by his fall, he
neither broke into execrations nor shod unmanly tears. He groaned, it is
true, and his arm pressed more heavily on the servant's shoulder, as he
listened and listened in vain for sign or so and of the runaways. But he
still commanded himself, and in face of how great a misfortune! A more
futile, a more wretched end to an expedition it was impossible to
conceive. The villains had out-paced, out-fought, and out-manoeuvred
him; and even now were rolling merrily on to Bath, while he, who a few
minutes before had held the game in his hands, lay belated here without
horses and without hope, in a wretched plight, his every moment
embittered by the thought of his mistress's fate.

In such crises--to give the devil his due--the lessons of the
gaming-table, dearly bought as they are, stand a man in stead. Sir
George's fancy pictured Julia a prisoner, trembling and dishevelled,
perhaps gagged and bound by the coarse hands of the brutes who had her
in their power; and the picture was one to drive a helpless man mad. Had
he dwelt on it long and done nothing it must have crazed him. But in his
life he had lost and won great sums at a coup, and learned to do the
one and the other with the same smile--it was the point of pride, the
form of his time and class. While M