"Why, that's a bit of news for you, partner," said Mr. Hannaford. "Bless my eighteen stun proper if it ain't. There's two or three o' them chaps about—'tecs."
"'Tecs?—detectives? Why, what's up, Mr. Hannaford?"
"There's been an escape from Dartmoor prison. Three of 'em in a fog. And one—you'd never guess!"
"Not old Hunt?"
"Hunt sure enough, partner."
"Hunt—good lord, poor old Egbert Hunt! And those chaps? After him? Do they think he's here?"
"They didn't know what to think," said Mr. Hannaford, and with a laugh at them for their puzzlement went into explanation. A fortnight ago the escape was made, it appeared. Two caught—one shot—but Hunt still missing. Traces of him in four burglaries, and each one nearer this way, and now the 'tecs here on the belief that he was making for the country-side he knew.
Percival met Ima's eyes and saw in them sympathy with the feelings given him by this news. "I knew you would be sorry," she said.
"Sorry!—why, Ima, it's awful, it's dreadful to me to think of poor old Egbert like that. One of them shot—and he hiding, terrified, no shelter, no food. When they catch him—I know what he is. He'll be mad—do anything. They'll shoot him down, perhaps."
She touched his hand and he was moved to catch hers that touched him and saw the blood tide up into her face. He had seen much of her in the winter following his illness when she had lived with Aunt Maggie. They were brother and sister, he had told her in those days, and when he had spoken of that night on Bracken Down before the fight: "Oh, it is forgotten," she had told him. "Forgotten, and forgotten all the foolish words I spoke. Nothing in them, Percival. Yes, you are my brother. I am your sister. That is it."