He was just emerging from the wood into the highroad when a buggy dashed past him, containing a man and a woman.  The woman wore a thick veil; the man was almost undistinguishable from dust.  The glimpse was momentary, but dislike has a keen eye, and in that glimpse Mr. Hamlin recognized Van Loo.  The situation was equally clear.  The bent heads and averted faces, the dust collected in the heedlessness of haste, the early hour,—­indicating a night-long flight,—­all made it plain to him that Van Loo was running away with some woman.  Mr. Hamlin had no moral scruples, but he had the ethics of a sportsman, which he knew Mr. Van Loo was not.  Whether the woman was an innocent schoolgirl or an actress, he was satisfied that Van Loo was doing a mean thing meanly.  Mr. Hamlin also had a taste for mischief, and whether the woman was or was not fair game, he knew that for his purposes Van Loo was.  With the greatest cheerfulness in the world he wheeled his horse and cantered after them.

They were evidently making for the Divide and a fresh horse, or to take the coach due an hour later.  It was Mr. Hamlin’s present object to circumvent this, and, therefore, it was quite in his way to return.  Incidentally, however, the superior speed of his horse gave him the opportunity of frequently lunging towards them at a furious pace, which had the effect of frantically increasing their own speed, when he would pull up with a silent laugh before he was fairly discovered, and allow the sound of his rapid horse’s hoofs to die out.  In this way he amused himself until the straggling town of the Divide came in sight, when, putting his spurs to his horse again, he managed, under pretense of the animal becoming ungovernable, to twice “cross the bows” of the fugitives, compelling them to slacken speed.  At the second of these passages Van Loo apparently lost prudence, and slashing out with his whip, the lash caught slightly on the counter of Hamlin’s horse.  Mr. Hamlin instantly acknowledged it by lifting his hat gravely, and speeded on to the hotel, arriving at the steps and throwing himself from the saddle exactly as the buggy drove up.  With characteristic audacity, he actually assisted the frightened and eager woman to alight and run into the hotel.  But in this action her veil was accidentally lifted.  Mr. Hamlin instantly recognized the pretty woman who had been pointed out to him in San Francisco as Mrs. Barker, the wife of one of the partners whose fortunes had interested him five years ago.  It struck him that this was an additional reason for his interference on Barker’s account, although personally he could not conceive why a man should ever try to prevent a woman from running away from him.  But then Mr. Hamlin’s personal experiences had been quite the other way.

It was enough, however, to cause him to lay his hand lightly on Van Loo’s arm as the latter, leaping down, was about to follow Mrs. Barker into the hotel.  “You’ll have time enough now,” said Hamlin.