Zacchary was standing by Mistress Keziah's chair, tears running down his cheeks. He had at last learned the secret of Marion's visit to Exeter.

For some time Mistress Keziah allowed him to talk, easing himself thus, she knew, of his grief and distress concerning Roger; and as she waited, Zacchary poured out a string of broken reminiscences from which the old lady unconsciously built up a picture of Marion's and Roger's childhood on the hillside at Garth.

She could well have wept herself. The morning had shown her no grounds for any reasonable hope; Zacchary's instant scorn for Marion's plans had secretly added to her own misgivings. Zacchary had scarcely, indeed, paid any heed to the scheme for Roger's release. In his mind it was a foregone failure: to him Master Roger was beyond all human redeeming. When at last he paused in his jumbled tale, and was staring sorrowfully out into the garden, Mistress Keziah brought her attention to the point at issue.

'I sent for you, Zacchary, because you are the only one we can trust with this secret. And also, you are the only one who can search for the bow and arrows.

'A bean't for doing aught of the kind, Mistress,' Zacchary rejoined, a stubbornness in his manner. ''Tis clean gone foolishness, the like as a never heard. More seemly 'twould be to set the horses to the coach and take the little maid home. Arrows, indeed! 'Tis the wild fancy of a maid who've set herself to do a man's work. 'Tain't no job for Mistress Marion. If you'd told me two days gone, Mistress, me and yonder Tony would have done something, and Reuben.'

Mistress Keziah controlled her rising impatience. She had not dreamed that Zacchary would rebel. At once she realised that the old man would have to be argued with, not commanded. His very virtues on which she had counted, his loyalty, his love for Marion and Roger, his fifty years' service at Garth, became a barrier that threatened the advancement of Marion's hopes.

'Don't you see, Zacchary, Master Roger is suffering this fate because he tried to help? Would the lad himself like it, think you, that strangers should be imperilled for his sake? Would he not rather die thrice over than allow Tony and Reuben to be drawn into gaol? And to leave that side of the question, what chance of safety has a secret shared with two such men? How much opportunity have you had of judging their characters? They are not of your county: a Londoner is never trusted by West country folk. A week you have passed in their company; they have proved able grooms on the road, they are mightily pleasant in the kitchen. Is that a reason why they should be entrusted with a mission which means life or death to a man they have never seen, and is of such exceeding danger, that should it fail, they might hang at the next assize? 'Tis a job for a man's friends.'

Zacchary, convinced on the point, but unwilling to own it, was silent. His slow peasant brain was working.

'If a body had ever heard of such a thing afore as bows and arrows to get a man out of gaol,' he said, after a while, 'I'd have some patience thinking on it.'

'By the mercy of Providence,' retorted the old lady, her eyes flashing in her angular old face, ''tis not every day in the week that a lad like Roger Trevannion lies within an hour of death, as you might say, and no help forthcoming. Extreme cases need extreme measures. For my part, I am willing to take all risks to help my niece. I had not expected to find an enemy in you, Zacchary. One might think you were unwilling to hold out to Master Roger a slender chance of life.'

''Tis the little maid I be thinking of now,' said Zacchary abruptly. 'If so be her's taken too, what be I to say to the Admur'l? Her was left in my care in Lunnon. 'Tis a hundred to one Master Roger will go just the same, and liker than not her'll be in gaol at the end on 't.'

'Give her the hundredth chance. And remember, she is a quick-witted, brave woman, playing a woman's game. You are always thinking of her as a little child. And,' added the lady, with an outward show that arrogantly hid her feelings, 'leave her safety to me. Do you think my niece, Admiral Penrock's daughter, will easily be imprisoned?'

Zacchary glanced at the old lady. 'You'm some like the Admur'l, Mistress. Well. How'm you going to hide the lad?'

'We are not going to hide him. To-morrow morning, early, you will take out two horses and wait outside the town. If you are seen, why, you are taking one of my greys up to the Stows. They are for travelling a spell, and one of their chestnuts has fallen lame. That is clear?'

Zacchary nodded gravely. 'And then? Be the lad going to take refuge on the moor?'

'Mistress Marion and Master Roger are going to ride to Garth.'

'To Garth!' The old man's voice showed his consternation. He stared at Mistress Keziah, as if unable to believe his own ears. 'To Garth? To the one place where every man, woman and child knows un? 'Tis sheer folly, Mistress!'

'That is just the reason why he will be safer there than anywhere. Because, as you say, it is sheer folly. They will search Exeter. They will beat the coast and the river. They will expect him to take to sea. Garth is the one place where they will never dream of looking for him.'

On Zacchary's slow mind there dawned the realisation that by its madness there was hope in the project laid down. Mistress Keziah, watching his face, knew that the time was come to drive hard. She looked at the clock.

'You have been here an hour and a half while you should have been at work. Leave all the rest. We will talk of it again later. Mistress Marion is out just now, seeking some purchase she needs. You can speak with her afterwards if you wish. Say nothing in the kitchen. Go first into the inn on the street. Get into conversation, and learn if there is any one who makes bows and arrows in Exeter. There must be some such, although archery has become but an idle pastime. And remember there are only a few hours. If only I could make you understand, Zacchary——' Mistress Keziah's voice broke, and tears stood in her eyes, 'you are the only help and hope we have. You, and no other, stand in between Master Roger and his death.'

Zacchary straightened himself. 'If there's one to be found, I'll find un, Mistress.'

'There is one to be found somewhere. But I have never been directly interested in archery. And the servants, who might know, being native to the town, I dare not send urgently without exciting curiosity. Mistress Marion went as far as she dared last night that way. We have to think of afterwards, of protecting her from any shadow of suspicion.'

'Ay,' said Zacchary. 'I heard on 't. Her turned William's head and no mistake. A's talked of nothing but bows and arrows and the mistress's eyes since. A little thought what the little maid was up to.'

Mistress Keziah went to a drawer, and took out her purse. 'Here is money. Spare nothing. But do not show any need of urgency. And above all, be careful in the kitchen.'

Zacchary went out without further words, and Mistress Keziah sank back in her chair.

It was close on eleven o'clock. She looked out into the garden, where, in the earlier part of the morning, Marion had been spending, to all appearance, an idle hour wandering to and fro with Simone at her side. Secretly Marion had counted the yards in the trim walks and grassy stretches until she had fixed on two slender trees as a target. The trunks stood close together, twin growths from one root. A certain spot, which Marion and Simone committed to memory, not daring to set a sign there, lest the servants should be watching, marked the distance of a hundred yards from the trees. Marion knew that if she could shoot at that distance into the crevice between the rising stems, she could shoot between the bars of Roger's cell. She determined to practise both by day and at night, when the servants were in bed; in the daylight shooting casually at any mark; in the dark or half light aiming at her target.

Everything was ready. The rope had been found by Marion in the harness room where her aunt had directed her; the file she had taken from the coachman's tool box. A note to Roger, directing him to scale the wall and run along the road to the courtyard gate, where she would be waiting him, was written and locked in her box, ready to be tied to the rope, with the file, later on. To please her mistress, Simone had laid out her riding habit. Her cloak was rolled into a bundle, to be strapped to the saddle. Everything was ready, so Marion had said, when she had kissed her aunt before setting out to buy a length of cord to take the place of the unsatisfactory piece she had found in her aunt's boxes. It only remained now for Mistress Keziah to send Zacchary to find a bow and arrows, a task which Zacchary could perform without any suspicion. He only needed to go to the New Inn for a pint of ale and get into conversation with mine host. All was quite clear in Marion's mind.

Mistress Keziah could still feel the girl's caress, could still see the suppressed eagerness in her face. The old woman sat motionless, only glancing at the clock from time to time. Already the day seemed interminable. The June sunshine bore too hotly into the room; she drew the shutter half way across and sat down again. There was a tension in the air of the house which, added to the languor of the day, weighed on her spirits. She dreaded Marion's return, dreaded Zacchary's return. As she had said, archery was merely a pastime, the implements of the craft not being found easily like the contents of the gunsmith's rooms. Quite likely William might unearth a bow and arrows in the course of the week—everything would happen just too late. And she was afraid to speak to William lest, later on, he should begin to think and remember. As she had said to Zacchary, Marion had gone as far in that direction as she dared.

All too soon the ............