An oil lamp burned low on the table by the bed. She turned up the wick, and picking up the lamp, went softly out on to the passage.
The house was in pitch darkness, and only Sir Hugh’s snores broke the silence, but Miss Thane was convinced that there had been other and very stealthy sounds. Her first thought was that someone had entered the house, presumably in search of Ludovic, and she was about to steal along the passage to rouse Nye, when another explanation of the faint sounds occurred to her. She went quickly to Ludovic’s room and scratched on, the door panel. There was no answer, and without the slightest hesitation she turned the handle and looked in.
One glance at the unruffled bed was enough to send her flying along the passage to wake Nye. This was easily done, and within two minutes of an urgent, low-voiced call to him through the keyhole, he was beside her on the passage, with a pair of breeches dragged on over his night-shirt, and his night-cap still on his head. When he heard that Ludovic was not in his room he stared at Miss Thane with a pucker between his brows, and said slowly: “He wouldn’t do it—not alone!”
“Where’s Clem?” demanded Miss Thane under her breath.
He shook his head. “No, no, Clem was of my own mind over this. You must have been mistook, ma’am. He wouldn’t set out to walk that distance, and he can’t saddle a horse with his arm in a sling.” He broke off suddenly, and his eyes narrowed. “By God, you’re right, ma’am!” he said. “He must have seen Abel! That accounts for him being so uncommon cheerful, drat the boy! Get you back to your room if you please, ma’am. I’ll have Clem saddle me a horse while I get some clothes on, and be off after them.”
Miss Thane had been thinking. “Wait, Nye, I’ve a better notion. Send Clem to inform Sir Tristram. You’ll not catch that wretched boy in time to stop him entering the Dower House, and once he has stepped into whatever trap may have been set for him, Sir Tristram’s perhaps the one person who might be able to get him out of it.”
Nye paused. After a moment’s reflection he said reluctantly:
“Ay, that’s true enough. And Clem’s a smaller man than what I am, and will ride faster. It’s you who have the head, ma’am.”
While Clem was flinging on his clothes, and Nye was in the stable saddling a horse, and Miss Thane was sitting on the edge of her bed wondering whether there was anything more she could do to avert disaster from Ludovic, the object of all this confusion was striding down the lane leading to Warninglid, quite oblivious of the possibility of pursuit. The moon, hidden from time to time behind drifting clouds, gave enough light to enable him to see his way, and in a little while showed him two horses, drawn up in the lee of a hedge of hornbeam.
Abel greeted him with a grunt, and offered him a flask produced from the depths of his pocket. “Play off your dust afore we start,” he recommended.