I saw it all now; and when the man had given me a valuable clue to the road which the carriage had taken—it had been met by some returning postboys—I set off again in pursuit in the now gathering dusk, as fast as I could make the new horse move.
I rode on till the dark fell: and still on till the moon rose and flooded the land with her thin light; and it was not until ten at night that I reached the end of my journey. Some peasants gave me the final clue. They had met the carriage and a question had been asked of them as to the whereabouts of a certain house. They told me now where this was, and a few minutes later I reached the place.
It was an old ramshackle house, once the seat of a family of good position but now fallen upon evil days. It made three sides of a square and the courtyard in the middle was all weed-grown, moss-covered and uneven, with one large yew tree standing dark and gloomy in the centre. The main entrance was in the middle portion; and there were two small gothic arched doors in the wings. But these seemed very stout as I examined them; and all the windows were latticed with stout ironwork.
Just the spot for such a venture as this, I thought, as I stole about the place to reconnoitre, treading softly, and keeping as much as possible in the dark shadows which the walls made.
There was not a sound to be heard, nor a light to be seen; while the look of the place made it certain that I should have a hard task to force my way inside. The same unpromising look of things met me when I left the front and crept round to the back and when I had seen all round the house I could not make up my mind what was the best thing to do.
There are times, however, when any kind of action is better than doing nothing. There was everything to be gained and nothing to be lost by Devinsky learning that I had followed him and knew his hiding-place. I resolved on a pretty bold course, therefore, and drawing my revolver I stepped out into the full moonlight and walked quickly to the main entrance.
I had reached to within ten yards of the door when a voice called to me:—
"Who goes there? What do you want? Stop, or I fire."
Looking up I saw the gleam of a rifle barrel levelled dead at me. I did not stop to answer but leaping aside, I darted forward into the doorway, where the man could not cover me with his weapon, because of a shallow porch which intervened to protect me.