Then he lunged through the doorway of the reception-room; but at the door opening on the street his courage gave way, and hunched up like one in pain, he ran towards the hitching-post where he had left his horses and wagon.

They were not there.

With a groan which was also a malediction, he went up the street like a wounded elephant, and made his way to the police-station through a town which had no pity for him.
During the hour he remained in the town, Mazarine searched in vain for his horses and wagon.

He looked everywhere except the shed behind the Methodist Church.

It was there the two wags who had played the trick on him had carefully hitched the horses, and presently they announced in town that they did it because they knew Mazarine would want to go to the prayer-meeting to lay his crimes before the Mercy Seat! It was quite true that it was prayer-meeting night, and as the merciless wags left the shed, the voice of brother Rigby the chemist was narrating for the hundredth time the story of his conversion, when, as he said, "the pains of hell gat hold of him." Brother Rigby loved to relate the tortures of the day when he was convicted of sin; but on this night his ancient story seemed appropriate, as he had dealt with great severity on the doings of the backslider, Joel Mazarine.
When the two wags returned to the front street of Askatoon, they were just in time to see the second meeting of Orlando and Mazarine.