Certain of them, agog to
pry his secret, followed him as he set out one day. They discovered
nothing. For hours they followed; but he, glancing ever over his
shoulder, pounded steadily on, mile upon mile--field, lane, high road,
hill and dale. He never shook them off though he ran; they never
brought him to standstill though indomitably they pursued. Towards
evening the exhausted procession came thundering up the village
street.
It was a very pale and haggard young man that bolted into the Colney
Arms that night.
II.
Three days had passed.
If George had the _Daily_ to curse for the miserable life of secrecy
and constant agony of discovery that he was compelled to lead, he had
it also to bless that his discovery by the red-headed Pinner boy had
not long ago led to his being run to earth. In its anxiety to cap the
satisfactory splash it was making over this Country House Outrage, the
_Daily_ had overstepped itself and militated against itself. Those
"Catchy Clues" were responsible. So cunningly did they inspire the
taste for amateur detective work, so easy did they make such work
appear, that Mr. Pinner, having thrashed silence into his red-headed
son, kept that son's discovery to himself. As he argued it--
laboriously pencilling down "data" in accordance with the "Catchy
Clue" directions,--as he argued it--if he communicated his knowledge
to the _Daily_ or to the local police, if he put them--(the word does
not print nicely) on the scent, ten to one they would capture the
thief and secure the reward.
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