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PART THREE
When Sard found that his bicycle was gone, he thought that the lodge-keepers had taken it within the lodge. He knocked at the lodge door to ask; getting no answer, he looked within: the lodge was empty, the bicycle was not there.
It was dim in that track through the forest: Sard struck a match to see what marks were on the ground. The earth was still moist from the rains. Two or three matches showed him that someone with long feet had taken two strides out of the road, wheeled the bicycle into the road and had then ridden away upon it. The tyre tracks were firmly printed on the road; the thief was no doubt heavy as well as tall.
Sard had never been heard to swear, either on deck or aloft; he did not swear now. He thought, “I am well paid, for leaving it out of my sight in a place like this. But he cannot be more than five minutes ahead of me, and may be only a minute. If I run, I may catch him.”
He took two more matches, carefully examined the tracks and made sure, mainly from the length of the feet, that the thief was a tall negro, wearing boots which needed soling, and that he was riding, not very fast, into the forest, away from Las Palomas. “I’ll catch him,” he said, “but I’ll have to be quick.”
He set off at a slow lope along the forest road, thinking that when he reached Enobbio’s, if he had not caught the thief, he would have to hire a horse, and gallop back to his duty. “I’m running it very close,” he said, “but I’ll do it yet. If the worst comes to the worst, the police-boat would run me on board, even if she’s out as far as the Rip-Raps. I’ve got half an hour of possible time; if I ride by the beach, thirty-five minutes.”
He stopped at the bridge to have another look at the tracks: they were still there, leading on towards Enobbio’s; so he set off again, at a quicker pace, through the forest, which was evil all about him all the time. He made good way to the clearing, which shone from the forge fire. A lamp was lit in the inn. Enobbio sat with his wife at a table there, eating frijoles from earthen platters and drinking wine and water from cups of horn. Sard hailed them at the door:
“Good-evening, señora and señor. May I intrude upon your peace to ask: Have you seen anyone ride by on a bicycle?”