'Done!' said the Viscount promptly. 'But it was your scheme, not mine.'

'Something coming!' announced Sir Roland suddenly.

Captain Heron sat up, and groped for his hat.

'That's no post-chaise,' said their guide and mentor, still chewing his blade of gra.s.s. He glanced up at the sun, calculating the time. 'Likely it's the Oxford stage.'

In a few moments the vehicle came into sight round a bend in the road, some way off. It was a great lumbering coach, drawn by six horses, and piled high with baggage. Beside the coachman sat an armed guard, and all over the roof such pa.s.sengers who could only afford to pay half their fare perched and clung precariously.

'Don't touch stage rablers myself,' remarked Mr Hawkins, watching the coach lurch and sway over the b.u.mps in the road.

'Nothing to be had but a rum fam or two, or a thin truss.'

The coach laboured ponderously on, and was presently lost to sight. The noise of the plodding hooves was borne back in the still air for long after it had gone, growing fainter and fainter until at last it died.

A solitary horseman bearing westwards pa.s.sed next. Mr.

Hawkins sniffed at him, and shook his head. 'Small game,' he said scornfully.

Silence, except for the trill of a lark somewhere overhead, again fell over the Heath. Captain Heron dozed peacefully; the Viscount took snuff. The sound of a coach travelling fast broke the stillness after perhaps twenty minutes had elapsed.

The Viscount nudged Captain Heron sharply, and picked up his mask. Mr Hawkins c.o.c.ked his head on one side, listening 'Six horses there,' he p.r.o.nounced. 'Hear 'em?'

The Viscount had risen, and put his mare's bridle over her head. He paused. 'Six?'

'Ay, outriders, I dessay. Might be the Mail.' He looked his three companions over. 'Four on us - what do you say, my bullies?'

'Good G.o.d, no!' replied the Viscount. 'Can't rob the Mail!'

Mr Hawkins sighed. 'It's a rare chance,' he said wistfully.

'Ah, what did I tell you? Bristol Mail, that is.'

The Mail had swept round the bend, accompanied by two outriders. The horses, nearing the end of the stage, were sweating, and one of the leaders showed signs of lameness, A wagon, going at a snail's pace along the white road, was the only other thing that relieved the monotony during the next quarter of an hour. Mr Hawkins remarked that he knew a cove who got a tidy living prigging the goods off tumblers, but he himself despised so debased a calling.

Sir Roland yawned. 'We've seen one stage, one mail, man riding a roan cob, and a wagon. I call it devilish dull, pel. Poor sport! Heron, did you think to bring a pack of cards?'

'No,' answered Captain Heron sleepily.

'No, no more did I,' said Sir Roland, and relapsed into silence.

Presently Mr Hawkins put his hand to his ear. 'Ah,' he said deeply, 'that sounds more like it! You want to get your masks on, gen'lemen. There's a chaise coming.'

'Don't believe it,' said Sir Roland gloomily, but he put his mask on and got into the saddle.

The Viscount fixed his own mask, and once more crushed the hat on to his head. 'Lord, Pom, if you could see yourself!'

he said.

Sir Roland, who was engaged in blowing the curtain of his mask away from his mouth, paused to say: 'I can see you, Pel.

That's enough. More than enough.'

Mr Hawkins mounted the brown gelding. 'Now, my bullies all, take it easy. We ride down on 'em, see? You wants to be careful how you looses off them pops. I'm a peaceable cove, and we don't want no killing.' He nodded at the Viscount.

'You're handy with your pop; you and me'll do the shooting, and mind it's over their n.o.bs!'

The Viscount drew one of his pistols from the holster.

'Wonder how the mare will take it?' he said cheerfully.' Steady, Firefly! Steady, la.s.s!'

A post-chaise drawn by four trotting horses came round the bend. Mr Hawkins s.n.a.t.c.hed at the Viscount's bridle. 'Easy, easy!' he begged. 'Give 'em time to come alongside! No sense in letting 'em see us yet. You wait on me.'

The post-chaise came on. 'Nice pair of wheelers,'

commented Sir Roland. 'Good holders.'

'Capting, you'll cover them postilions, see?' ordered Mr Hawkins.

'If we don't move soon, there'll be no postilions to cover!'

snapped the Viscount. 'Come on, man!'

The post-chaise was almost abreast of them. Mr Hawkins released the Viscount's bridle. 'At 'em, then!' he said, and drove his heels into his horse.

'Yoiks! Forrard away!' halloed Sir Roland, and thundered down the slope, waving his pistol.

'Pom, don't you let that barker off!' shouted the Viscount, abreast of him, and levelling his own slenderer weapon.

Rising in his stirrups, he pulled the trigger, and saw one of the postilions duck as the shot whistled over his head. The mare shied violently and tried to bolt. He held her head on her course, and came down like a thunderbolt across the road.

'Stand and deliver! - steady, la.s.s!'

The postilions had dragged their frightened horses to a standstill. Captain Heron pressed up closer, covering them with his pistol. Sir Roland, a connoisseur of horse-flesh, had allowed his attention to be diverted by the two wheelers, and was studying them closely.

The Viscount and Mr Hawkins had ridden up to the chaise.

The window was let down with a bang, and an old gentleman with a red face pushed his head and shoulders out, and extending his arm fired a small pistol at the Viscount.

'Dastardly rogues! Cut-throat robbers! Drive on, you cowardly rascals!' he spluttered.

The shot sang past the Viscount's ear; the mare reared up in alarm, and was steadied again. 'Hi, mind what you're about, sir!' said his lordship indignantly. 'You devilish near got me in the head!'

Mr Hawkins on the other side of the chaise, thrust his pistol into the old gentleman's face. 'Drop your pops!' he growled.

'And step out, d'you see? Come on, out with you!' He let the reins fall on his horse's neck, and leaned sideways in the saddle, and wrenched open the door of the chaise. 'A rare gager, you are! Hand over your truss! Ah, and that pretty lobb o' yourn!'

The Viscount said quickly: 'Draw off, you fool! Wrong man!'

'Lordy, he's good enough for me!' replied Mr Hawkins, wresting a snuff-box from the old gentleman's grasp. 'A nice little lobb, this! Come on now, where's your truss?'

'I'll have the Watch on you!' raved his victim. 'd.a.m.nable!

Broad daylight! Take that, you thief!' With which he dashed his hat at Mr Hawkins's pistol, and diving back into the coach seized a long ebony cane.

'Lord, he'll have an apoplexy,' said the Viscount, and rode round the chaise to Mr Hawkins's side. 'Give me that snuffbox,' he ordered briefly. 'Edward! Here, Edward! Take the fool away! We've got the wrong man.' He dodged a blow aimed at his head with the ebony cane, tossed the snuff-box into the chaise, and reined back. 'Let 'em go, Pom!' he called.

Sir Roland came round to him. 'Wrong man, is it? Tell you what, Pel - as nice a pair of wheelers as I've seen. Just what I've been looking for. Think he'd sell?'

The old gentleman, still perched on the step of the chaise, shook his fist at them. 'Murderous dogs!' he raved. 'You'll find I'm a match for you, you rogues! Don't like the look of this little cane of mine, eh? I'll break the head of the first man to come a step nearer! Robbers and cowards! White-livered scoundrels! Drive on, you d.a.m.ned shivering fools! Ride 'em down!'

Captain Heron, in charge of the baffled Mr Hawkins, said in a voice that shook with suppressed mirth: 'For G.o.d's sake come away! He'll burst a blood-vessel at this rate.'

'Wait a bit,' said Sir Roland. He swept off his abominable beaver, a,nd bowed over his horse's withers. 'Haven't the honour of knowing your name, sir, but you've a very pretty pair of wheelers there. Looking for just such a pair.'

The old gentleman gave a scream of rage. 'Insolence! Steal my horses, would you? Postilion! I command you, drive on!'

'No, no! a.s.sure you nothing of the sort!' protested Sir Roland.

Captain Heron bore down upon him, and seizing his bridle, dragged him away. 'Come away,' he said, 'you'll ruin us all, you young madman!'

Sir Roland allowed himself to be led off. 'A pity,' he said, shaking his head. 'Great pity. Never saw such a queer-tempered fellow.'

The Viscount, who was speaking a few pithy words to Mr Hawkins, turned his head. 'How the devil should he know you wanted to buy his horses? Besides, we haven't time to buy horses. We'd better get back to our ambush. Mare stood the firing pretty well, didn't you, sweetheart?'

Captain Heron watched the chaise rolling away up the road.

'He'll lay information in Hounslow, Pelham, you mark my words.'

'Let him,' said the Viscount. 'He won't get the Watch out against us. Why, we didn't take a thing!'

'Not a thing,' muttered Mr Hawkins sulkily. 'And him with his strong-box under the seat! Dang me if ever I works with flash culls again!'

'Don't keep on saying that,' said the Viscount. 'You can take what you like from the right man, but you don't rob anyone else while you're with me!'

They rode on up the slope, and once more dismounted.

'Well, if I'm broke for this, I think I'll take to the - what-do-you call it? Bridle-lay. I'd no notion it was so easy,' said Captain Heron.

'Yes, but I don't like the clothes,' said the Viscount.

'Devilish hot!'

Sir Roland sighed. 'Beautiful wheelers!' he murmured sadly.

The afternoon wore on. Another wagon lumbered past, three more hors.e.m.e.n, and one stage.

'Can't have missed the fellow, can we?' fretted the Viscount.

'All we missed was our luncheon,' replied Captain Heron.

He pulled his watch out. 'It's on three already, and I dine in South Street at five.'

'Dining with my mother, are you?' said the Viscount. 'Well, the cook's d.a.m.ned bad, Edward, and so I warn you. Couldn't stand it myself. One reason why I live in lodgings. What's that, Hawkins? Heard something?'

'There's a chaise coming up the road,' said Mr Hawkins.

'And I hope it's the right one,' he added bitterly.

When it came into sight, a smart, shining affair, slung on very high swan's-neck springs, the Viscount said: 'That's more like it! Now then, Pom, we've got him!'

The manoeuvre that had succeeded so well with the first chaise, succeeded again. The postilions, alarmed to find no less than four ruffians descending on them, drew up in a hurry.

Captain Heron once more covered them with his pistol, and the Viscount dashed up to the chaise, shouting in as gruff a voice as he could a.s.sume: 'Stand and deliver there! Come on, out of that!'

There were two gentlemen in the chaise. The younger of them started forward, levelling a small pistol. The other laid a hand on his wrist. 'Don't fire, my dear boy,' he said placidly 'I would really rather that you did not.'

The Viscount's pistol hand dropped. He uttered a smothered exclamation.

'Wrong again!' growled Mr Hawkins disgustedly.

The Earl of Rule stepped unhurriedly down on to the road.

His placid gaze rested on the Viscount's mare. 'Dear me!' he said. 'And - er - what do you want me to deliver, Pelham?'

Chapter Twenty-One.

Not long after four o'clock a furious knocking was heard on the door of the Earl of Rule's town house. Horatia, who was on her way upstairs to change her gown, stopped and turned pale.

When the porter opened the door and she saw Sir Foland Pommeroy on the doorstep without his hat, she gave a shriek, and sped down the stairs again. 'Good G-G.o.d, what has happened?' she cried.

Sir Roland, who seemed much out of breath, bowed punctiliously. 'Apologize unseemly haste, ma'am! Must beg a word in private!'

'Yes, yes, of c-course!' said Horatia, and dragged him into the library. 'Someone's k-killed? Oh, n-not Pelham? Not P-Pelham?'

'No, ma'am, upon my honour! Nothing of that sort. Most unfortunate chance! Pel desired me to apprise you instantly.

Rode home post-haste - left my horse nearest stables - ran round to wait on you. Not a moment to lose!'

'Well, w-what is it?' demanded Horatia. 'You found L-Lethbridge?'