the gravelled pathway for them to see the descent. Then one by one they
went quietly down the steps, and West shut the door behind them.

"Excellent! Excellent!" exclaimed Doctor Bartholomew, as the gate was
reached with no untoward happenings. "Not a soul knows we're gone, boys.
That's pretty certain. Now, then, out of the gate and turn to the right
up that lane. It'll take us to the very edge of the Fens, I believe, and
then our search will commence."

He spoke with assurance, and they followed him instinctively.
Unconsciously they had made him captain of the expedition. But--no one
had heard them, he had said? If he had looked back once when the big gate
shut, he might have changed his mind upon that score. With white face
pressed close against the glass of the smoking-room window, which looked
directly out upon the front path, stood Borkins, watching them as though
he were watching a line of ghosts on their nightly prowl.

"Good Gawd!" he ejaculated, as he discerned their dark figures and the
light of the doctor's torch. "Every one of 'em gone--_every one_!" And
then, trembling, he went back to bed.

But the doctor did not look back, and so the little party proceeded upon
its way in comparative silence until the edge of the Fens was reached.
Here, with one accord, they stopped for further instructions. Three
torches made the spot upon which they stood like daylight. The doctor
bent his eyes downward.

"Now, boys," he said briskly. "Keep your eyes sharp for footprints. Wynne
must have struck off here into the Fens, it's the most direct course. He
wouldn't have been such a duffer as to walk too far out of his way--if he