Chapter 171

158 MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE was pursuing. The land undulated very remarkably ; and my path for the last hour had wound about and about so confusedly in its effort to keep in the valleys, that I no longer knew in what direction lay the sweet village of B , where I had determined to stop for the night. The sun had scarcely shone , strictly speaking, during the day, which nevertheless had been unpleasantly warm. A smoky mist, resembling that of the Indian summer, enveloped all things, and, of course, added to my uncertainty. Not that I cared much about the matter. If I did not hit upon the village before sunset, or even before dark, it was more than possible that a little Dutch farmhouse, or something of that kind, would soon make its appearance, although, in fact, the neighborhood (perhaps on account of being more picturesque than fertile) was very sparsely inhabited. At all events, with my knapsack for a pillow, and my hound for a sentry, a bivouac in the open air was just the thing which would have amused me. I sauntered on, therefore, quite at ease, Ponto taking charge of my gun, until at length, just as I had begun to consider whether the numerous little glades that led hither and thither were intended to be paths at all, I was conducted by one of the most promising of them into an unquestionable carriage track. There could be no mistaking it. The traces of light wheels were evident; and although the tall shrubberies and overgrown undergrowth met overhead, there was no obstruction whatever below, even to the passage of a Virginian mountain wagon, the most aspiring vehicle, I take it, of its kind. The road, however, except in being open through the wood, if wood be not too weighty a name for such an assemblage of light trees, and except in the particulars of evident wheeltracks, bore no resemblance to any road I had before seen. The tracks of which I speak were but faintly perceptible, having been impressed upon the firm yet pleasantly moist surface of what looked more like green Genoese velvet