"Shoot the lot, Sir, if I had the chance. I would, O by Jove; that is,
if I had dust shot in the gun--a set of rogues, rascals, scamps, tramps,
vagabonds, and robbers. Don't tell me about pheasants and partridges
and hares being wild birds--there don't laugh; of course, I know a hare
isn't a bird--why, they're nothing of the sort, and if it wasn't for
preserving, there wouldn't be one left in a few years. Try a little
more of that bread sauce. Fine pair of tender young cocks, ain't they?
Well, sir, they cost me seven-and-sixpence a bird at the very least, and
I suppose I could buy them at seven-and-sixpence a brace at the outside.
Game preserving's dear work, sir; but there, don't think I want to
spoil your dinner. I aint reckoning up the cost of your mouthfuls, but
fighting upon principle. How should you like me to come into your yard,
or field, or garden, and shoot or suffocate or wire your turkeys or
peafowl?"
"But, my dear, sir," I said, "I don't keep turkeys or peafowl."
"Or cocks or hens, or pigeons, or ducks," continued my uncle, not
noticing my remark.
"But we don't keep anything of the kind in London, my dear sir; the
tiles and leads are the unpreserved grounds of the sparrows."
"Don't be a fool, Dick," said my uncle, pettishly. "You know well
enough what I mean. And I maintain, sir," he continued, growing very
red-faced and protuberant, as to his eyes, "that every poacher is a
down-right robber, and if I were a magistrate I--"
"Wouldn't shoot them; would you, sir?" said Jenny, roguishly.
"Hold your tongue, you puss," said my uncle, shaking his fist playfully
at the bright, saucy-eyed maiden; "you're as bad as Dick."
Oh, how ardently I wished she was in one particular point of view.
My uncle continued. "Ever since I've been in the place, the scoundrels
have gone on thin--thin--thin--till it's enough to make one give up in
despair. But I won't; hang me if I do! I won't be beaten by the
hypocritical canting dogs. Now, look here; one hound whines out that he
did it for hunger, but it won't do, that's a tale; while 'fore George,
sir, if a man really was driven to that pitch, I'd give him the worth of
a dozen of my birds sooner than have them stolen."
Well, really, one could not help condoling with the old gentleman, for
he was generous and open-handed to an extent that made me wonder
sometimes how my portion would fare, and whether the noble old fellow
might not break faith through inability to perform his promises. Ever
since he had settled in Hareby, and worked hard to get his estate into
condition, the poaching fraternity seemed to have made a dead set at
him, leading his two keepers a sad life, for one of them had passed two
months in hospital through an encounter; while one fellow, who was
always suspected of being at the head of the gang, generally contrived
to elude capture, being "as cunning as Lucifer, sir," as my uncle said.
I was down at Hareby to spend Christmas, as had been my custom for
years, and on going out the day after my arrival--
"You see, sir," said Browsem, the keeper; "there's no knowing where to
take him. I've tried all I knows, and 'pon my sivvy, sir, I don't know
where to hev him. It warn't him as give me that dressing down, but it
were some of his set, for he keeps in the back grun', and finds the
powder and shot, and gets rid o' the birds. War-hawk to him if I do get
hold on him, though--"
"But do you watch well?" I said.
"Watch, sir? I've watched my hyes outer my head a'most, and then he's
dodged me. Hyes aint no good to him. Why, I don't believe a chap
fitted up with telescopes would get round him. The guv'nor swears and
goes on at me and Bill, but what's the good o' that when you're arter a
fellow as would slip outer his skin, if you hed holt on him? Now, I'll
jest tell you how he served me last week. I gets a simple-looking chap,
a stranger to these parts, but a regular deep one, to come over and keep
his hye on this here Mr Ruddle. So he hangs about the public, and
drinks with first one, and then with another, so that they thinks him a
chap outer work, and lars of all he gets friendly with Ruddle, and from
one thing to another, gets on talking about fezzans and 'ares.
"`Ah,' says my chap, `there's some fine spinneys down our way. Go out
of a night there, and get a sackful of birds when you likes.'
"`Nothin' to what there is here,' says another.
"`Why,' says my chap, `we've one chap as is the best hand at a bit o'
night work as ever I did see. You should see him set a sneer or ingle,
he'd captivate any mortial thing. Say he wants a few rabbuds, he'd
a'most whistle 'em outer their holes. Fezzans 'll run their heads into
his ingles like winkin'. While, as fur 'ares, he never sets wires for
them.'
"`Why not,' says one on 'em.
"`Oh,' says my chap, `he goes and picks 'em up outer the fields, just as
he likes.'
"`Ha, ha, ha!' laughs lots on 'em there; all but Ruddle, and he didn't.
"`What d'yer think o' that, ole man,' says one.
"`Nothin' at all,' says Ruddle. `Do it mysen,' for you see he was a bit
on, and ready to talk, while mostlings he was as close as a hegg.
"`Bet you a gallon on it,' says my chap.
"`Done,' says Ruddle, and they settles as my chap and Buddie should have
a walk nex' day, Sunday, and settle it.
"Nex' day then these two goes out together, and just ketching sight on
'em, I knowed something was up, but in course I didn't know my chap, and
my chap didn't know me, and I sits at home smoking a pipe, for I says to
myself, I says: Browsem, I says, there's suthin' up, an' if you can only
put salt on that 'ere Ruddle's tail, you'll soon clear the village. You
see, I on'y wanted to bring one home to him, and that would have done,
for he'd on'y got off two or three times before by the skin of his
teeth, and while three or four of his tools was kicking their heels in
gaol, my gentleman was feathering his nest all right.
"So my chap and Ruddle goes along werry sociable, only every now and
then my chap ketches him a cocking one of his old gimlet eyes round at
him, while he looked as knowing and deep as an old dog-fox. By and by
they gets to a field, and old Ruddle tells my chap to stop by the hedge,
and he did, while Ruddle goes looking about a bit slowly and quietly,
and last of all he mounts up on a gate and stands with his hand over his
hyes. Last of all he walks quietly right out into the middle of the
pasture and stoops down, picks up a hare, and holds it kicking and
struggling by the ears, when he hugs it up on his arm strokin' on it
like you'd see a little girl with a kitten.
"My chap feels ready to burst himself with delight to see how old Ruddle
had fallen into the trap. First-rate it was, you know--taking a hare in
open daylight, and in sight of a witness. So he scuffles up to him,
looking as innocent all the time as a babby, and he says to him, he
says--
"`My, what a fine un! I never thought as there was another one in
England could ha' done that 'ere. You air a deep 'un,' he says, trying
hard not to grin. `But aintcher going to kill it?'
"A nasty foxy warming, not he though, for when my chap says, says he,
`Aintcher going to kill it?'
"`What,' he says, `kill the pooty creetur! Oh, no; poor soft pussy, I
wouldn't hurt it; let it go, poor thing.'
"When if he didn't put it down and let it dart off like a shot, while my
chap stood dumbfounded, and staring with his mouth half open, till
Ruddle tipped him a wink, and went off and left him. No, sir, there
ain't no taking that chap nohow, and they do say it was his hand that
fired the shot as killed Squire Todd's keeper in Bunkin's Spinney."
Three nights after Christmas was mild and open, and I was watching a
busy little set of fingers prepare the tea, while my uncle was napping
in his easy-chair, with a yellow silk handkerchief spread over his face.
I had been whispering very earnestly, while all my impressive words had
been treated as if airy nothings; and more than once I had been most
decidedly snubbed. I was at last sitting with a very lachrymose
countenance, looking appealingly at the stern little tyrant, who would
keep looking so bewilderingly pretty by trying to frown with a beautiful
little white brow that would not wrinkle, when the parlour-maid came up
and announced Browsem.
"No, sir," muttered my uncle; "I'll put a stop--stop--" the rest was
inaudible.
"The keeper waits to see you, uncle dear," whispered his late sister's
child, in her soft kittenish way.
"Keeper, sir; yes, sir, I'll give him--Bless my heart, Jenny," exclaimed
the old gentleman starting up, dragging off his handkerchief and
bringing the hair down over his forehead; "bless my heart, Jenny, why I
was almost asleep."
"Here's Browsem, uncle," I said.
"Show him up; show him up," cried my uncle, who would not have accorded
more attention to an ambassador than he did to his keeper--that
gentleman being prime minister to his pleasures.
Browsem was shown up--a process which did not become the keeper at all,
for he came in delicately as to pace, not appearance, and held his red
cotton handkerchief in his hand, as if in doubt whether to employ it in
dabbing his damp brow, or to spread upon the carpet for fear that his
boots might soil the brightness.
"Now Browsem," cried the old gentleman, as the keeper was pulling his
forelock to Miss Jenny, thereby making the poor fellow start and
stammer. "Now Browsem, whom have you caught?"
"Caught, sir? No one, sir, only the cat, sir. Ponto run her down, but
she skretched one of his eyes a'most out."
"Cat; what cat?" said my uncle, leaning forward, with a hand upon each
arm of the chair.
"Why, you see, sir," said Browsem, confidentially, "there's a dodge in
it;" and then the man turned round and winked at me.
"Confound you; go on," cried my uncle in a most exasperated tone of
voice, when Browsem backed against Jenny's little marqueterie
work-table, and, oversetting it, sent bobbins, tapes, reels, wools,
silks, and, crochet and tatting apparatus into irremediable chaos.
"There, never mind that trash," shouted the old man; "speak up at once."
"Well, sir," said Browsem, "they've been a-dodgin' of me."
"Well?" cried my uncle.
"Tied a lanthorn to a cat's neck, and sent her out in the open, to make
belief as it were a dog driving the partridges."
"Well?"
"And we've been a-hunting it for long enew, and Ponto ketched her at
last."
"Well?"
"And this was only to get us outer the way, for I heard a gun down
Bunkin's Spinney."
"Well?" shouted my uncle.
"And I've come to know what's right to be done."
"Done," roared my uncle; "why run down to the Spinney, or there won't be
a pheasant left. Here, my stick--my pistols--Here, Dick--Confound--
Scoundrels. Look sharp." And then he hobbled out of the room after the
keeper, when warm with the excitement of perhaps having a brush with the
poachers, I was following, but a voice detained me on the threshold.
"Richard," whispered Jenny; and there was something in the earnest eyes
and frightened look that drew me back in an instant. "Richard, you
won't go--those men--danger--Oh! Richard, pray! There, don't. What
would your uncle say?"
I didn't know, neither did I pause to think, for that newly-awakened
earnestness whispered such sweet hopes that, darting back, I was for the
instant forgetful of all propriety, till some one stood blushing before
me, arranging those bright little curls so lately resting upon my arm.
"But you won't go?" pleaded Jenny. "For _my_ sake Richard?"
"Di-i-i-i-i-ck," roared my uncle, and, wresting myself from the silken
chains, I darted down into the hall.
"Here lay hold of that stick, my lad," cried my uncle, flourishing a
large bludgeon, while Browsem grinning and showing his teeth, was
quietly twisting the leathern thong of a short stout staff round his
wrist.
"All right my darling," said the old man, turning to the pale-faced
Jenny, who had come quietly downstairs to where we stood. "Don't be
alarmed, we shall take care of one another, and march half a dozen
poaching--here, come along, or me shall miss the scoundrels."
Browsem led the way at a half-trot, and grasping my arm, the old
gentleman followed as fast as his sometimes gouty leg would allow him.
We were soon out of the grounds, and, clambering a gate, made our way
towards the wood, where the keeper had heard the gun.
"Confound them," growled my uncle, "that's where that poor fellow was
shot ten years ago."
"Bang--bang."
"There they are, sir," growled the keeper, halting to let us get up
alongside; and now I started, for in the dusk behind me, and apparently
dodging my heels, was a tall figure.
"It's only Todds, sir," growled the keeper, and Todds his helper growled
in response.
"That is right."
"Amost wonder as they came here, sir," whispered Browsem. "Never knowed
'em do it afore, 'cause they're feared o' Munday's Ghost."
"Munday's Ghost?" I said.
"Yes, sir; pore chap as were shot. They do say as he walks still, but
there's a sight o' pheasants here."
It was one of those dark heavy nights late in winter, when the last
oak-leaves have fallen, and every step you take through the thickly
strewn glades rustles loudly. The wind just sighed by us as we pressed
on along a path through a plantation, and then once or twice I fancied I
heard guns to the right, far off behind the house. But I forgot them
the next moment, for my heart beat, and the excitement increased, for
just on in front came two loud and distinct reports.
"They're at it," growled my uncle, forgetting his gout, and loosing my
arm. "Now Browsem, you and Todds go round, and we'll come forward, only
mind when I whistle, it's for help."
The next moment I was going to speak to the keeper, but I started, for
he was gone, and on looking behind I found Todds had also vanished,
quiet as a snake, for my uncle and I stood alone.
"You'll stick to me, Dick?" whispered the old gentleman.
"Conditions," I said in the same voice.
"What? the white feather," growled the old gentleman.
"No, no," I said, "but if I enlist now on your side, will you join me in
a siege afterwards?"
"Siege? what the deuce? Why don't you speak plain, sir?"
"Well," I said, "I mean about--about--a certain young lady at the
Priory, you know."
"Confound your thick head, sir. Why, if you had had an ounce of brains,
you could have seen what I meant, and--"
"Bang, bang!" from the wood.
"Forward," shouted my uncle, and crossing a small open field, we entered
the Spinney.
Now, if I were to say that I was brave, the assertion would be a fib,
for I possess but few of the qualifications for making a good soldier;
but all the same, as we pushed our way in that night amongst the thick
hazel stubs, I felt a sort of tingly sensation in my arm, which made me
grasp my weapon more tightly, and feel as if I wished there was
something to hit.
"Keep your eyes well open, Dick," whispered my uncle, "and if you come
across a tall thin squinting rascal with his nose on one side, mind,
that's Ruddle's. Fell him to the ground in an instant, sir. No mercy:
capture him as you love me, and if you do take the scoundrel, you shall
have another cool thousand down on your wedding morning."
"And if I don't?" I whispered.
"Hold your tongue, you dog, and don't talk nonsense."
On we went in silence as to our tongues, but with the leaves rustling
and sticks cracking as we pushed on. Now I could hear my uncle
ejaculating; then he'd stumble and mutter, while once I had to haul him
out of a small hole half full of water.
"Confound it!" growled the old gentleman; "but I'll pay some one for all
this. Open out a bit to the right, Dick."
I separated from the main body, and on we still pressed, rustling and
crackling along, while now and again I could make out the well-defined
forms of pheasants roosting amidst the low branches of the trees. All
at once I heard my uncle stop short, for about a hundred yards to my
right there came again a sharp "bang, bang" of two guns.
"Push on, my boy," whispered the old gentleman, closing up; and then, as
fast as we could for the dense undergrowth, we made our way in the
direction of the sounds. "They're out strong, my boy, but we're four
determined men with right on our side, and a prize to win; eh, you dog?"
"Oof!" I involuntarily exclaimed, for just then my uncle gave me a poke
in the ribs with his stick--very facetiously, no doubt; but it hurt.
We were now in the thickest part of the wood; and, after going a little
farther, I felt my shoulder clutched, and "Here they come," was
whispered in my ear. "Seize one man, Dick, and hold on to him like a
bull-dog."
Just then I could hear in front the sharp crackling and rustling made by
bodies being forced through the underwood; and, grasping my staff and
pressing eagerly forward, I waited with beating heart for the coming of
the enemy.
I did not have to wait long, for the next moment I was face to face with
Browsem.
"Lord, sir! I thought it had been one on 'em," he exclaimed, and then a
whispered consultation having been held, we opened out about twenty
yards apart, and went straight away in the direction we supposed the
poachers to have taken.
On, slowly and painfully, with the twigs flying back and lashing our
faces, roots trying to trip us up, and the night growing darker and
darker. Right and left I could hear my uncle and Browsem, while right
off beyond the old gentleman, Mr Todds, the reticent, was making his
way. Every eye was strained and every ear attent to catch the slightest
sound; but for quite ten minutes we crept on until right in our rear
came the sharp, loud report of a gun; and then, after the interval of a
few moments, another louder and apparently nearer.
"Back again!" cried my uncle; and then, casting off all caution, we all
pushed forward eagerly, closing in as we went, till we were only
separated by a few bushes, so that I could hear the hard breathing on
either side. Hard work blundering and stumbling along; but the will was
good, and at last we all drew up again in a small opening, panting, hot,
and regularly breathed.
"Hist!" whispered my uncle, and we all listened eagerly; but, with the
exception of a wild, strange cry some distance off, all was silent.
"What's that?" I whispered to Browsem.
"Only a howl, sir," he whispered again. "Blessed rum start this, ain't
it?"
"Bang, bang!" again a hundred yards off.
"Come on!" roared my uncle furiously, "there won't be a bird left in the
place;" and away we dashed again, but only to pull up once more,
regularly puzzled.
"'Tain't no good, sir," whispered Browsem. "We might go on like this
all night, and ketch no one."
"Why?" I said, mopping my brow.
"That 'ere, sir, as I said was a howl, must ha' been Munday's Ghost, and
them 'ere shots as we keeps hearing's the ones as killed the poor
fellow, and that's why the poachers never comes to this bit."
"Browsem," puffed my uncle.
"Yes, sir," said Browsem.
"You're a fool, Browsem," puffed my uncle.
"Thanky, sir," said Browsem.
"What do you mean by that, sir?" cried my uncle, fiercely.
"Nothing, sir," said the keeper, mildly.
"For two pins, sir," cried my uncle, fiercely, "I'd discharge you, sir.
D'yer hear? discharge you, sir, for talking such foolery. Ghosts--
posts! pooh! bah! puff! stuff! yah! Forward."
Mr Todds, who was at my elbow, murmured his approval of his superior's
language, but gave a superstitious shiver at the same moment. And then
once more we opened out, and tramped through the wood, till regularly
beaten out; and, without having heard another shot or seen a single
enemy, we reluctantly retraced our steps to the Priory.
The next morning, at breakfast, the parlour-maid again announced
Browsem--for my uncle abjures men-servants in the house--and the keeper,
looking puzzled and long-faced, appeared at the door.
"Now, then," sputtered my uncle, "have you caught them?"
"They cleared Sandy Plants last night, sir," growled the man.
"Who? what?" cried my uncle, upsetting his coffee.
"Some on 'em--Ruddles's, I s'pose," said Browsem. "Don't b'leeve
there's a tail left out'er scores," said the man.
"There, go down and wait, and I'll come directly after breakfast."
But to all intents and purposes my uncle had finished his breakfast, for
nothing more would he touch, while his face grew purple with rage.
Gout--everything--was forgotten for the time; and half an hour after,
Browsem was pointing out the signs of the havoc made on the preceding
night in the fir-plantation. Here and there lay feathers, spots of
blood, gun-wads; and many a trunk was scarred and flayed with shot. In
one place, where the trees were largest, the poachers seemed to have
been burning sulphur beneath the boughs, while twice over we came upon
wounded pheasants, and one dead--hung high up in the stubbly branches,
where it had caught.
My uncle looked furious, and then turning in the direction of the scene
of the last night's adventures, he strode off, and we followed in
silence.
On reaching the wood, we very soon found, from the trampled underwood
and broken twigs, traces of our chase; but the birds seemed plentiful,
and no feathers or blood-stains were to be found.
"They didn't get many here, at all events," muttered my uncle.
Both Browsem and Todds shook their heads at me, and looked ghosts.
"Strange thing, though," muttered my uncle. "What do you think of it,
Browsem?"
The keeper screwed up his face, and said nothing.
"Confound you for a donkey!" ejaculated the irascible old gentleman.
"What Tom-fool rubbish you men do believe. Hullo! though, here's a
wad;" and he stooped and picked up a wadding evidently cut out of an old
beaver hat. "That don't look ghostly, at all events; does it, booby?"
Browsem only screwed up his phiz a little tighter.
"Why, tut, tut, tut! Come here, Dick!" shouted the old gentleman,
excitedly. "We've been done, my lad; and they've cleared out the
plantation while we were racing up and down here."
I followed the old gentleman to one of the openings where we had stopped
together the night before, when Todds, who was close behind, suddenly
gave a grunt, and stooping down, picked up a half-empty horn
powder-flask.
"That's Ruddles's, I'd swear," growled Browsem.
"Of course," said my uncle. "And now, look here, Dick," he cried,
pointing to the half-burnt gun-wads lying about near a large pollard
oak. "There, shin up, and look down inside this tree."
With very little difficulty, I wonderingly climbed up some fifteen feet,
by means of the low branches, which came off clayey on my hands, as
though some one had mounted by that same means lately, and then I found
that I could look down right through the hollow trunk, which was lighted
by a hole here and there.
"That'll do; come down," cried my uncle. "If I'd only thought of it
last night, we could have boxed the rascal up--a vagabond! keeping us
racing up and down the wood, while he sat snugly in his hole, blazing
away directly we were a few yards off."
I was certainly very close to Jenny that afternoon when my uncle, whom
we thought to be napping in his study, rushed into the room.
"Hurrah, Dick! Tompkins has peached, and they sent fifty pheasants up
in Ruddles's cart this morning; but the old rascal's locked up, and--
hum! That sort of thing looks pretty," he continued, for we were
certainly taken somewhat by surprise. "But, you dog," he roared, as
Jenny darted from the room, "you did not catch the scoundrel."
However, after that morning's take, even if a hundred pheasants had been
sent in the cart, my uncle would have been plastic as clay, while, an
hour afterwards, he exclaimed:
"Why, Dick, I'd almost forgotten my gout."