“No.”
“Nor hear other footsteps?”
“No, none but my own at last—none.”
It was no clew. Unconsciously Ralph put his hand to his breast and touched the paper that he had placed there. No, there was no hope. The shadow that had fallen had fallen forever.
“Perhaps the man recovered enough to walk a hundred yards, and then fell dead. Perhaps he had struggled to reach home?”
“He would be going the wrong way for that, Ralph.”
“True, true; it's very strange, very, if it is as you say. He was fifty yards beyond the smithy—north of it?”
“He was.”
The dalesmen walked on. They had got down into the road, when the little schoolmaster ran up against them almost before he had been seen.
“Oh, here you are, are you?” he gasped.