stone wall; the sheep were massed in one corner,
heads to the wall, tails to the bare centre of the fold; they kept
crowding closer and more close.

In that bared space of hoof-trampled earth she saw him lying.

She leaped down, the frightened sheep riding one another in their
frantic efforts to get away from the invaders of their peace. She knelt
by him; lifted his head on her knee; her hands touched his sleeve, she
drew back from something warm and wet.

"Champney--O Champney, what has he done to you!" she moaned in hopeless
terror; "what shall I do--"

"Is it you--Aileen?--help me up--"

With her aid he raised himself to a sitting posture.

"It must have been the loss of blood--I felt faint suddenly." He spoke
clearly. "Can you help me?"

"Yes, oh, yes--only tell me how."

"If you could bind this up--have you anything--"

"Yes, oh, yes--"

He used his left hand entirely; it was the right arm that had received
the full blow of some sharp instrument. "Just tear away the
shirt--that's right--"

She did as he bade her. She took her handkerchief and bound the arm
tightly above the wound, twisting it with one of her shell hairpins. She
slipped off her white petticoat, stripped it, and under his directions
bandaged the arm firmly.

He spoke to her then as if she were a personality and not an instrument.

"Aileen, it's all up with me if I am found here--if I don't get out of
this--tell my mother I was trying to see her--to get some funds, I have
nothing. I depended on my knowledge of this country to escape--put them
off the track--they're after me now--aren't they?"

"Yes--"

"I thought so; I should have got across to the house if the quarry
lights hadn't been turned on so suddenly--I knew they'd got word when I
saw that--still, I might have made the run, but that man throttled me--I
must go--"

He got on his feet. At that moment they both started violently at the
sound of something worrying at the gate; there was a rattle at the bars,
a scramble, a frightened bleating among the sheep, a joyous bark--and
Rag flung himself first upon Aileen then on Champney.

He caught the dog by the throat, choking him into silence, and handed
him to Aileen.

"For God's sake, keep the dog away--don't let him come--keep him quiet,
or I'm lost--" he dropped over the wall and disappeared in the woods.

Here and there across the pastures a lantern shot its unsteady rays. The
posse had begun their night's work.

The do