Six or seven miles lay between me and the highroad to Bristowe through Worcester and Gloucester, but I knew of a short cut four miles from the Hall, which would bring me into the road at the turnpike at Deuxhill, some way farther south, and save a good three miles of the road.  I had learned of this short cut in the course of my fishing expeditions with Roger; it was the nearest way to the Borle Brook, where our angling had ever the best success—­a narrow track striking off to the right, very rutty and rough, bordered by hedges, and uphill but not steep.

I had tramped three miles or more, at a good pace, when I heard galloping horses behind me, and the rumble of wheels.  Turning about, I saw a coach drawn by three horses, with a postilion on the leader, approaching at a great rate, jolting and swaying in a manner that bespoke desperate haste.

I stood aside to let it pass, holding my nose against the whirling dust cloud it raised, and giving it but a glance as it rattled by.  The shutters were up; I could not see whether it held anybody; and when it had passed I again took the middle of the road, wondering idly what necessity there might be for so great speed.  Only a minute or two afterwards I heard a light patter close at my heels, and looking back without stopping, I was surprised to see the big black retriever which belonged to Mistress Lucy, and with which, since my first meeting with him in the garden, I had been on friendly terms.  The dog uttered a low bark when he recognized me, fawned upon me, and then set off running ahead.  I noticed now that the beast left a thin trail of blood on the ground.  He had not run far when he stopped, turned round, and barked as if to invite me on, not waiting, however, to see whether I responded.

For a moment I was too much taken up with wondering by what mishap the dog had been wounded to connect his appearance, and his evident wish to urge me on, with the coach that had lately passed.  But then the connection struck upon me in a flash, and I began to run with all my might.  The dog had doubtless accompanied his mistress on her morning ride; he could only have been wounded in defending her; she must have been waylaid, and, thought linking itself with thought, I guessed that Sir Richard Cludde had taken this means of asserting his claim to her guardianship, and the man I had seen in the coppice a few days before was an emissary of his.  Without a doubt she was now a prisoner in the coach, being carried against her will to Shrewsbury.

The road here ran steeply downhill, and the coach was out of sight round a bend.  Without pausing to consider the chances of overtaking it, I leapt rather than ran forward, soon outstripping the dog, which had done his best, poor beast, but was now well-nigh exhausted.  I flung away my staff, that encumbered me, and tore headlong down the hill, till, coming to the bend, where the road sloped upwards, I caught sight once more of the coach, no more than half a mile ahead of me.  This surprised me, for neither the ascent nor my speed could account for its nearness, and I wondered, as I pounded after it, whether I had after all been mistaken.