‘What a man can it be?’ said the shepherd.

The rest, between the awfulness of their late discovery and the odd conduct of this third visitor, looked as if they knew not what to think, and said nothing.  Instinctively they withdrew further and further from the grim gentleman in their midst, whom some of them seemed to take for the Prince of Darkness himself; till they formed a remote circle, an empty space of floor being left between them and him —

   ’ . . . circulus, cujus centrum diabolus.’

The room was so silent—­though there were more than twenty people in it—­that nothing could be heard but the patter of the rain against the window-shutters, accompanied by the occasional hiss of a stray drop that fell down the chimney into the fire, and the steady puffing of the man in the corner, who had now resumed his pipe of long clay.

The stillness was unexpectedly broken.  The distant sound of a gun reverberated through the air—­apparently from the direction of the county-town.

‘Be jiggered!’ cried the stranger who had sung the song, jumping up.

‘What does that mean?’ asked several.

‘A prisoner escaped from the jail—­that’s what it means.’

All listened.  The sound was repeated, and none of them spoke but the man in the chimney-corner, who said quietly, ’I’ve often been told that in this county they fire a gun at such times; but I never heard it till now.’

‘I wonder if it is my man?’ murmured the personage in cinder-gray.

‘Surely it is!’ said the shepherd involuntarily.  ’And surely we’ve zeed him!  That little man who looked in at the door by now, and quivered like a leaf when he zeed ye and heard your song!’

‘His teeth chattered, and the breath went out of his body,’ said the dairyman.

‘And his heart seemed to sink within him like a stone,’ said Oliver Giles.

‘And he bolted as if he’d been shot at,’ said the hedge-carpenter.

’True—­his teeth chattered, and his heart seemed to sink; and he bolted as if he’d been shot at,’ slowly summed up the man in the chimney-corner.

‘I didn’t notice it,’ remarked the hangman.

‘We were all a-wondering what made him run off in such a fright,’ faltered one of the women against the wall, ’and now ‘tis explained!’

The firing of the alarm-gun went on at intervals, low and sullenly, and their suspicions became a certainty.  The sinister gentleman in cinder-gray roused himself.  ‘Is there a constable here?’ he asked, in thick tones.  ‘If so, let him step forward.’

The engaged man of fifty stepped quavering out from the wall, his betrothed beginning to sob on the back of the chair.

‘You are a sworn constable?’

‘I be, sir.’

’Then pursue the criminal at once, with assistance, and bring him back here.  He can’t have gone far.’

’I will, sir, I will—­when I’ve got my staff.  I’ll go home and get it, and come sharp here, and start in a body.’