“Well, no,” he said, “I have not had the pleasure of seeing him here to-day.  Did he express the intention of paying me a visit?”

“No, sir, no!” said Piers impatiently.  “I only thought it possible, that’s all.  Good-bye!”

He swung round and departed, leaving the worthy Vicar looking after him with a shrewd and not over-friendly smile at the corners of his eyes.

Beyond the Vicarage the road wound round again to the park, and Piers followed it.  It led to a gate that opened upon a riding which was a favourite stretch for a gallop with both Sir Beverley and himself.  Through this he passed, no longer running, but striding over the springy, turf between the budding beech saplings at a pace that soon took him into the heart of the woodland.

Pressing on, he came at length to a cross-riding, and here on boggy ground he discovered recent hoof-marks.  There were a good many of them, and he was puzzled for a time as to the direction they had taken.  The animal seemed to have wandered to and fro.  But he found a continuous track at length and followed it.

It led to an old summer-house perched on a slope that overlooked the scene of Jeanie’s accident in the winter.  A cold wind drove down upon him as he ascended.  The sky was grey with scurrying clouds.  The bare downs looked indescribably desolate.

Piers hastened along with set teeth.  The dread he would not acknowledge hung like a numbing weight upon him.  Somehow, inexplicably, he knew that he was nearing the end of his quest.

The long moan of the wind was the only sound to be heard.  It seemed to fill the world.  No voice of bird or beast came from near or far.  He seemed to travel through a vast emptiness—­the only living thing astir.

He reached the thatched summer-house at last, noted with a curious detachment that it was beginning to look dilapidated, wondered if he would find it after all deserted, and the next moment was nearly overwhelmed by a huge grey body that hurled itself upon him from the interior of the little arbour.

It was Caesar the great Dalmatian who greeted him thus effusively, and Piers realized in an instant that the dog had some news to impart.  He pushed him aside with a brief word of welcome and entered the ivy-grown place.

“Hullo!” gasped a voice with painful utterance.  “Hullo!”

And in a moment he discerned Sir Beverley crouched in a corner, grey-faced, his riding-whip still clutched in his hand.

Impetuously he went to him, stooped above him.  “What on earth has happened, sir?  You haven’t been thrown?” he queried anxiously.

“Thrown!  I!” Sir Beverley’s voice cracked derisively.  “No!  I got off—­to have a look at the place,—­and the brute jibbed—­and gave me the slip.”

The words came with difficult jerks, his breathing was short and laboured.  Piers, bending over him, saw a spasm of pain contract the grey face that nevertheless looked so indomitably into his.