“Charmian spoke truth!  O God, I thank thee!”

I burst through a hedge, running on, and on—­careless alike of being seen, of capture or escape, of prison or freedom, for in my heart was a great joy.

I was conscious of shouts and cries, but I heeded them no more, listening only to the song of happiness my heart was singing: 

“Charmian spoke truth, her hands are clean.  O God, I thank thee!”

And, as I went, I presently espied a caravan, and before it a fire of sticks, above which a man was bending, who, raising his head, stared at me as I approached.  He was a strange-looking man, who glared at me with one eye and leered jocosely with the other; and, being spent and short of breath, I stopped, and wiping the sweat from my eyes I saw that it was blood.

“How—­is Lewis?” I panted.

“What,” exclaimed the man, drawing nearer, “is it you?—­James! but you’re a picter, you are—­hallo!” he stopped, as his glance encountered the steel that glittered upon my wrist; while upon the silence the shouts swelled, drawing near and nearer.

“So—­the Runners is arter you, are they, young feller?”

“Yes,” said I; “yes.  You have only to cry out, and they will take me, for I can fight no more, nor run any farther; this knock on the head has made me very dizzy.”

“Then—­take a pull at this ’ere,” said he, and thrust a flat bottle into my hand.  The fiery spirit burned my throat, but almost immediately my strength and courage revived.

“Better?”

“Much better,” I answered, returning the bottle, “and I thank you—­”

“Don’t go for to thank me, young feller,” said he, driving the cork into the bottle with a blow of his fist, “you thank that young feller as once done as much for me—­at a fair.  An’ now —­cutaway—­run!—­the ’edge is good and dark, up yonder—­lay low a bit, and leave these damned Runners to me.”  I obeyed without more ado, and, as I ran up the lane, I heard him shouting and swearing as though engaged in a desperate encounter; and, turning in the shadow of the hedge, I saw him met by two men, with whom, still shouting and gesticulating excitedly, he set off, running —­down the lane.

And so I, once more, turned my face London-wards.

The blood still flowed from the cut in my head, getting often into my eyes, yet I made good progress notwithstanding.  But, little by little, the effect of the spirits wore off, a drowsiness stole over me, my limbs felt numbed and heavy.  And with this came strange fancies and a dread of the dark.  Sometimes it seemed that odd lights danced before my eyes, like marsh-fires, and strange, voices gabbled in my ears, furiously unintelligible, with laughter in a high-pitched key; sometimes I cast myself down in the dewy grass, only to start up again, trembling, and run on till I was breathless; but ever I struggled forward, despite the throbbing of my broken head, and the gnawing hunger that consumed me.