"Of course," he interrupted sharply. "Well, where is Parmiter?" and I laid a finger on the map.

"Between Fenny Bridges and Exeter," said he, leaning forward. "He has made great haste."

He spoke quite seriously, not questioning my conjecture, but accepting it as a mere statement of fact.

"That is a heath?" he asked, pointing to an inch or so where the map was shaded on each side of the high-road. "Yes, a heath t'other side of Hartley Row; I know it. There should be a mail-coach there, and the horses out of the shafts, and one or two men in crape masks and a lady in a swoon, and the driver stretched in the middle of the road with a bullet through his crop."

"I do not see that," I returned. "But here, beyond Axminster----"

"Well?"

He leaned yet further forward.

"There is a forest here."

"Yes."

"I saw a man on horseback ride into it between the trees. He has not as yet emerged from it."