“Not ahead,” said Hilary. “We’ve got to decide, old man.”

“Take my advice, and let me drive you home, Uncle Hilary.”

“Shall we, Adrian?”

Adrian shook his head.

“I shall go on.”

“All right, I’m with you.”

“Look!” said Fleur suddenly, and pointed.

Some fifty yards in, along a rough track leaving the road to the left, lay a dark object.

“It’s a coat, I think.”

Adrian jumped out and ran towards it. He returned with a blue overcoat over his arm.

“No doubt now,” he said. “Either he was sitting there and left it by mistake, or he tired of carrying it. It’s a bad sign, whichever it was. Come along, Hilary!”

He dropped the coat in the car.

“What orders for me, Uncle Hilary?”

“You’ve been a brick, my dear. Would you be still more of a brick and wait here another hour? If we’re not back by then, go down and keep close along under the Downs slowly by way of Sutton Bignor and West Burton, then if there’s no sign of us anywhere along that way, take the main road through Pulborough back to London. If you’ve any money to spare, you might lend us some.”

Fleur took out her bag.

“Three pounds. Shall I give you two?”

“Gratefully received,” said Hilary. “Adrian and I never have any money. We’re the poorest family in England, I do believe. Good-bye, my dear, and thank you! Now, old man!”

CHAPTER 28

Waving their hands to where Fleur stood by her car with the remaining apple raised to her lips, the two brothers took the track on to the Down.

“You lead,” said Hilary; “you’ve got the best eyes, and your clothes are less conspicuous. If you sight him, we’ll consult.”

They came almost at once on a long stretch of high wire fence running across the Down.

“It ends there to the left,” said Adrian; “we’ll go round it above the woods; the lower we keep the better.”

They kept round it on the hillside over grass rougher and more uneven, falling into a climber’s loping stride as if once more they were off on some long and difficult ascent. The doubt whether they would catch up with Ferse, what they could do if they did, and the knowledge that it might be a maniac with whom they had to deal, brought to both their faces a look that soldiers have, and sailors, and men climbing mountains, of out-staring what was before them.

They had crossed an old and shallow chalk working and were mounting the few feet to the level on its far side, when Adrian dropped back and pulled Hilary down.

“He’s there,” he whispered; “about seventy yards ahead!”

“See you?”

“No. He looks wild. His hat’s gone, and he’s gesticulating. What shall we do?”

“Put your head up through that bush.”

Adrian knelt, watching. Ferse had ceased to gesticulate, he was standing with arms crossed and his bare head bent. His back was to Adrian, and, but for that still, square, wrapped-in attitude, there was nothing to judge from. He suddenly uncrossed his arms, shook his head from side to side and began to walk rapidly on. Adrian waited till he had disappeared among the bushes on the slope, and beckoned Hilary to follow.

“We mustn’t let him get too far ahead,” muttered Hilary, “or we shan’t know whether he’s taken to the wood.”

“He’ll keep to the open, he wants air, poor devil. Look out!” He pulled Hilary down again. The ground had suddenly begun to dip. It sloped right down to a grassy hollow, and halfway down the slope they could see Ferse plainly. He was walking slowly, clearly unconscious of pursuit. Every now and then his hands would go up to his bare head, as if to clear away something that entangled it.

“God!” murmured Adrian: “I hate to see him.”

Hilary nodded.

They lay watching. Part of the weald was visible, rich with colour on that sunny autumn day. The grass, after heavy morning dew, was scented still; the sky of the dim spiritual blue that runs almost to white above the chalky downs. And the day was silent well-nigh to breathlessness. The brothers waited without speaking.

Ferse had reached the level at the bottom; they could see him dejectedly moving across a rough field towards a spinney. A pheasant rose just in front of him; they saw him start, as if wakened from a dream, and stand watching its rising flight.

“I expect he knows every foot round here,” said Adrian: “he was a keen sportsman.” And just then Ferse threw up his hands as if they held a gun. There was something oddly reassuring in that action.

“Now,” said Hilary, as Ferse disappeared in the spinney, “run!” They dashed down the hill, and hurried along over rough ground.

“Suppose,” gasped Adrian, “that he’s stopped in the spinney.”

“Risk it! Gently now, till we can see the rise.”

About a hundred yards beyond the spinney, Ferse was plodding slowly up the hill.

“All right so far,” murmured Hilary, “we must wait till that rise flattens out and we lose sight of him. This is a queer business, old boy, for you and me. And at the end of it, as Fleur said: What?”

“We MUST KNOW,” said Adrian.

“We’re just losing him now. Let’s give him five minutes. I’ll time it.”

That five minutes seemed interminable. A jay squawked from the wooded hillside, a rabbit stole out and squatted in front of them; faint shiverings of air passed through the spinney.

“Now!” said Hilary. They rose, and breasted the grass rise at a good pace. “If he comes back on his tracks, here—”

“The sooner it’s face to face the better,” said Adrian, “but if he sees us following he’ll run, and we shall lose him.”

“Go slow, old man. It’s beginning to flatten.”

Cautiously they topped the rise. The Down now dipped a little to where a chalky track ran above a beech wood to their left. There was no sign of Ferse.

“Either he’s gone into the wood or he’s through that next thicket, and on the rise again. We’d better hurry and make sure.”

They ran along the track between deep banks, and were turning into the brush, when the sound of a voice not twenty yards ahead jerked them to a standstill. They dropped back behind the bank and lay breathless. Somewhere in the thicket Ferse was muttering to himself. They could hear no words, but the voice gave them both a miserable feeling.

“Poor chap!” whispered Hilary: “shall we go on, and try to comfort him?”

“Listen!”

There was the sound as of a branch cracking underfoot, a muttered oath, and then with appalling suddenness a huntsman’s scream. It had a quality that froze the blood. Adrian said:

“Pretty ghastly! But he’s broken covert.”

Cautiously they moved into the thicket; Ferse was running for the Down that rose from the end of it.

“He didn’t see us, did he?”

“No, or he’d be looking back. Wait till we lose sight of him again.”

“This is poor work,” said Hilary, suddenly, “but I agree with you it’s got to be done. That was a horrible sound! But we must know exactly what we’re going to do, old man.”

“I was thinking,” said Adrian, “if we could induce him to come back to Chelsea, we’d keep Diana and the children away, dismiss the maids, and get him special attendants. I’d stay there with him till it was properly fixed. It seems to me that his own house is the only chance.”

“I don’t believe he’ll come of his free will.”

“In that case, God knows! I won’t have a hand in caging him.”

“What if he tries to kill himself?”

“That’s up to you, Hilary.”

Hilary was silent.

“Don’t bet on my cloth,” he said, suddenly; “a slum parson is pretty hard-boiled.”

Adrian gripped his hand. “He’s out of sight now.”

“Come on, then!”

They crossed the level at a sharp pace and began mounting the rise. Up there the character of the ground changed, the hill was covered sparsely by hawthorn bushes, and yew trees, and bramble, with here and there a young beech. It gave good cover, and they moved more freely.