A Double Knot

by George Manville Fenn

It was a desperate leap, but in the dread which had seized him, the fugitive would have taken one of greater danger, for something seemed to tell him that he was fleeing from death, and that death was the stronger of the two.

He fell heavily, and cut his knees and hands upon the rough gravel, but he was up again, leaped the hedge beside the lane, and was hurrying across the meadow in the hope that Huish would not miss him until he reached the next station.

Glancing back, though, when he had run some fifty yards, he uttered a shriek that was like that of a frightened woman, for he could see Huish passing the hedge, and now he knew it was a trial of speed and endurance.

“He’ll kill me,” he cried hoarsely, as with trembling hands he pulled out the revolver from his breast, and, thrusting a hand into his pockets, sought for a cartridge to replace that which he had fired; but his fingers refused their office; and giving up the task, he ran on across meadow after meadow, checked by the hedges, and aiming afterwards at the gates.

A grim smile overspread his face as, after about a mile had been covered, he glanced back to see that he was the faster of the two, and, aiming for the open country, he pressed on.

“I shall tire him out,” he muttered as he toiled on, feeling disposed to throw away the revolver, but fearing to part with what might prove the means of saving his life.

The country was wooded and park-like; and with a strange perversity he sought the open, when he might have obtained help had he sought the nearest village. It was as if, in this time of peril, he, the clever, scheming, ready-witted man, had lost all command over his actions, and every nerve seemed concentrated upon the sole thought of fleeing from his pursuer.

They were too far ahead in their start to be seen by the porters who ran up the line from the station, and then followed their footprints across the meadows, so that there were no witnesses to the savage, relentless pursuit of the one, and the blind, terror-stricken flight of the other.

The pursued was right: unchecked by illness and confinement, he was the swifter of the two, gradually placing more distance between himself and his pursuer; but he had not calculated upon the latter’s stern determination.

For after a few minutes, in place of exerting himself to overtake his quarry, John Huish settled down into a steady, plodding run, husbanding his strength, and contented to keep his double in sight.