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accord it a very deep regard. And now that faculty warned me that she was in danger, too. And Jenny was all that I had…far more than I deserved – but all that I had.
    We ran into Anise a little before midday – to the very great surprise of John and Audrey Bagot, for, after all, they were on their honeymoon. Still, I honestly think that they were glad to see us, and, after all, they were no ordinary friends. Being such, they at once agreed to play their part, that is to say, to keep Jenny as safe as a jewel in its drawer; and they actually wrote out a wire, to send to their man, summoning him to Anise, for he knew Punter by sight and could stand by the side of John Bagot, if trouble came. But, though this was reassuring, I was not reassured. Jenny was happy and smiling, as though the word ‘apprehension’ was one that she did not know: but then she had a great heart and was in all things a most obedient wife; and I found it hard to believe that forty odd miles had put to rout the danger in which she stood.
    It was about half-past three that I bade her goodbye and took my seat beside Mansel, with Carson behind. Our plan was, so to speak, fluid, depending on what we found. But we hoped to locate the rogues and, having done that, to let one of their number see us and see the way we took. If we could do this, we could draw them on to the ground upon which we proposed to meet them and have things out; “for we can’t have a scandal,” said Mansel, “and so we must do our stuff in the countryside.” Since Bell had ‘lost’ them in Pau, that was the region for which we proposed to make; and, with or without Jenny, Bell was to meet us by Orthez the following night.
    We had covered some ninety miles and had spoken hardly a word, when I came to a sudden decision and touched Mansel on the arm.
    “Yes, William?”
    “Please go back to Anise,” was all I said.
    Mansel looked at me sharply.
    Then, seeing a turning ahead, he set a foot on the brake…
    A moment later we were flying the way we had come.
    Anise was no more than a hamlet, but it boasted a fine, old inn, with an archway which would have accepted a coach and four: this gave to a cobbled yard, on one side of which was a coach house, now used for cars. The most agreeable rooms were at the back of the inn: they were on the first floor and faced south, commanding a charming prospect of woods and meadows and water, in the shape of a lazy stream. Though, on three of its sides, the meadows ran up to the house, you could not enter them without passing under the archway and into the road; but this was a small price to pay for the privacy of the apartments in which, when we were at Anise, we ate and slept. They were, indeed, as secluded as Anise itself, and that was why Mansel and I had frequently stayed at the inn: I am sure that our host never talked and that many a passer-by has broken his fast at the inn and has never dreamed that he was not its only guest. Still, unless you cared to keep house, you were bound to use the highway for fifty or sixty yards: then you came to an aged gate which made you free of the meadows, the stream and the forest beyond.
    When we were nearing the hamlet, I began to feel more at ease. I remember turning to Mansel and telling him so. “But I can’t say I’m sorry,” I added, “because it wouldn’t be true. What we’re to do with Jenny, I really don’t know: but I should have been useless to you, if we’d left her behind.”
    “Don’t worry, William,” said Mansel. “As like as not, you’ve done us a very good turn. If your apprehension is sound, it can only mean that one or more of our friends are coming to Anise tonight. What in the world could be better? We see them; but we take care that they don’t see us – until they have left the place: we can put the cars in a meadow and lie very close ourselves. We follow and overtake them and pass them by, and then we let them chase us…on to the ground we have chosen… We’ll