the mask which the man wore was brown. This happened two years ago, out
beyond Barnet."

"And without that brown mask no one knows him." said the man who had
first spoken of him. "He has been met on all the roads, north, south,
east and west--never in company, always alone. He never fails, yet the
blood-feasters have watched for him in vain. Truly, he disappears as
mysteriously as the devil might. He may go to Court. He may be a
well-known figure there, gaming with the best, a favoured suitor where
beauty smiles. He may even have been here amongst us at the 'Punch-Bowl'
without our knowing it."

"It is not impossible," Gentleman Jack admitted, smiling a little at the
others' enthusiasm.

"I envy him," was the answer. "We seem mean beside such a man as
Galloping Hermit."

"I do not cry 'Yes' to that," said Gentleman Jack, just in time to
prevent an outburst from the landlady, who appeared to fancy that the
quality of her entertainment was being called in question. "The brown
mask conceals a personality, no doubt, but before we can judge between
man and man we must know something of their various opportunities. Were
he careful and lucky, such a man as my bishop would be hard to run to
earth. Galloping Hermit is careful, for only at considerable intervals
do we hear of him. The road would seem to be a pastime with him, rather
than a life he loved. For me, the night never comes that I do not long
to be in the saddle, that I do not crave for the excitement, even if
there be no spoil worth the trouble of taking. This man is different. He
is only abroad when the quarry is certain. True, success has been his,