Page:Anthony Hope - Rupert of Hentzau.djvu/150

140 dismounted, we tied our horses to trees and went forward at a quick silent walk. Our idea was that Sapt should enter on pretext of having been sent by the Queen to attend to her husband's comfort and arrange for his return without further fatigue next day. If Rupert had come and gone, the King's demeanour would probably betray the fact; if he had not yet come, I and James, patrolling outside, would bar his passage. There was a third possibility: he might be even now with the King. Our course in such a case we left unsettled; so far as I had any plan, it was to kill Rupert and try to convince the King that the letter was a forgery—a desperate hope, so desperate that we turned our eyes away from the possibility which would make it our only resource.

We were now very near the hunting-lodge, being about forty yards from the front of it. All at once Sapt threw himself on his stomach on the ground.

"Give me a match," he whispered.

James struck a light, and the night being still the flame burnt brightly: it showed us the mark of a horse's hoof, apparently quite fresh, and leading away from the lodge. We rose and went on, following the tracks by the aid of more matches till we reached a tree twenty yards from the door. Here the hoof-marks ceased; but beyond there was a double track of human feet in the soft black