"Our good friend the peddler will look blank enough when morning comes and they find the birds are flown." But Paul could not triumph quite so soon; he was still far from feeling assured of safety, and feared their escape might be quickly made known, in which case pursuit would be hot.

The best hope lay in getting into the forest, which might give them shelter, and enable them to baffle pursuit; but responsibility lay sore upon him, and he could not be quite as gay as his comrade.
The moon shone out from behind the clouds, and presently they slipped beneath the arches of the old bridge, and past the grim fortress of the Tower.

Very soon after that, they were gliding between green and lonely banks in a marshy land, and they presently effected a landing and struck northward, guiding themselves by the position of the moon.
It was a strange, desolate country they traversed, and glad enough was Paul that it was night when they had to cross this unprotected fiat land.

By day they would be visible for miles to the trained eye of a highwayman, and if pursued would fall an easy prey.

But by crossing this desolate waste at night, when not a living thing was to be seen, they might gain the dark aisles of the wood by the time the tardy dawn stole upon them, and once there Paul thought he could breathe freely again.
All through the long hours of the night the lads trudged onwards side by side.