on.

"Then you won't move a step or speak a word unless you're told. Do you
mark that?"

The boy nodded; he did mark it.

Thereupon, much to his relief, the gag was taken from his mouth, and he
felt himself hauled out of the ignominious sack.

"A drink!" he gasped.

"There he goes; I said he'd do it. Clap the gag on again."

Poor blindfolded Percy could only wave his head appealingly. He would
sooner have his throat cut than feel that gag back between his teeth.
His captors let him off this once, and one of them untied the cords from
his legs. He was too cramped to attempt to make any use of this partial
liberty, even had he been so minded, and sank down, half fainting, to
the ground.

"Give him a drink," said one of the voices; and in a moment or two he
felt a cup of delicious water held to his parched lips, reviving him as
if by magic. A few coarse pieces of bread were also thrust between his
lips; these he swallowed painfully, for his jaws were stiff and aching,
and his teeth had almost forgotten their cunning. However, when the
meal was over he felt better, and would gladly have slept upon it for an
hour or two, had he been allowed.

But this was no part of his captors' programme. They had not relaxed
his bonds to indulge any such luxurious craving. Overstone Church had
already sounded eleven, and they were due in an hour at the mountain
shed.

"Get up and step out," said one of them, pulling the boy roughly to his
feet.

"All very well," said Percy to himself, as he stumbled forward on his
cramped limbs; "they'll have to give me a leg up if they want me to go
the pace. Where are we going to next, I'd like to know?"

"Come, stir yourself," said the man again, accompanying his words by a
rough shake.

Percy responded by toppling over on his face. He who knew the way to
swim against stream ten miles an hour, was just now unable to walk half
a dozen paces on solid ground.

"Best shove him in the sack again," growled the other man.

The bare mention of that sack startled poor Percy to his feet. If he
might only have spoken he could easily have explained the trifling
difficulty which prevented his "stepping out." As it was, all he could
do was to struggle forward bravely for a few more paces, and then again
fall. The men seemed to perceive that there was something more than
mere playfulness in this twice-repeated performance, and solved the
difficulty by clutching him one under each arm, a