Three stout oak rails had been nailed across from tree to tree, and on a board above them was roughly painted: "No thoroughfare.

Tresspassers will be prosecuted." For a moment the young man hesitated, his dread of the law being virtuously deep, and his mind well assured that his father would not back him up against settled authorities.

But the shame of turning back, and the quick sense of wrong, which had long been demanding some outlet, conquered his calmer judgment, and he cast the basket from his back.

Then swinging his favourite axe, he rushed at the oaken bars, and with a few strokes sent them rolling down the steep bank-side.
"That for your stoppage of a right of way!" he cried; "and now perhaps you'll want to know who done it." To gratify this natural curiosity he drew a piece of chalk from his pocket, and wrote on the notice-board in large round hand, "Daniel Tugwell, son of Zebedee Tugwell, of Springhaven." But suddenly his smile of satisfaction fled, and his face turned as white as the chalk in his hand.

At the next turn of the path, a few yards before him, in the gray gloom cast by an ivy-mantled tree, stood a tall dark figure, with the right arm raised.