COPPERHOUSE CROSS AND BROUGHTON SPINNIES.
After all, the thing had not been so very bad. With a little courage
and hardihood we can survive very great catastrophes, and go through
them even without broken bones. Phineas, when he got up to his room,
found that he had spent the evening in company with Madame Goesler,
and had not suffered materially, except at the very first moment of
the meeting. He had not said a word to the lady, except such as were
spoken in mixed conversation with her and others; but they had been
together, and no bones had been broken. It could not be that his
old intimacy should be renewed, but he could now encounter her in
society, as the Fates might direct, without a renewal of that feeling
of dismay which had been so heavy on him.
He was about to undress when there came a knock at the door, and his
host entered the room. "What do you mean to do about smoking?" Lord
Chiltern asked.
"Nothing at all."
"There's a fire in the smoking-room, but I'm tired, and I want to
go to bed. Baldock doesn't smoke. Gerard Maule is smoking in his
own room, I take it. You'll probably find Spooner at this moment
established somewhere in the back slums, having a pipe with old
Doggett, and planning retribution. You can join them if you please."
"Not to-night, I think. They wouldn't trust me,--and I should spoil
their plans."
"They certainly wouldn't trust you,--or any other human being. You
don't mind a horse that baulks a little, do you?"
"I'm not going to hunt, Chiltern."
"Yes, you are. I've got it all arranged. Don't you be a fool, and
make us all uncomfortable. Everybody rides here;--every man, woman,
and child about the place. You shall have one of the best horses I've
got;--only you must be particular about your spurs."
"Indeed, I'd rather not. The truth is, I can't afford to ride my own
horses, and therefore I'd rather not ride my friends'."
"That's all gammon. When Violet wrote she told you you'd be expected
to come out. Your old flame, Madame Max, will be there, and I tell
you she has a very pretty idea of keeping to hounds. Only Dandolo has
that little defect."
"Is Dandolo the horse?"
"Yes;--Dandolo is the horse. He's up to a stone over your weight, and
can do any mortal thing within a horse's compass. Cox won't ride him
because he baulks, and so he has come into my stable. If you'll only
let him know that you're on his back, and have got a pair of spurs on
your heels with rowels in them, he'll take you anywhere. Good-night,
old fellow. You can smoke if you choose, you know."
Phineas had resolved that he would not hunt; but, nevertheless, he
had brought boots with him, and breeches, fancying that if he did not
he would be forced out without those comfortable appurtenances. But
there came across his heart a feeling that he had reached a time of
life in which it was no longer comfortable for him to live as a poor
man with men who were rich. It had been his lot to do so when he was
younger, and there had been some pleasure in it; but now he would
rather live alone and dwell upon the memories of the past. He, too,
might have been rich, and have had horses at command, had he chosen
to sacrifice himself for money.
On the next morning they started in a huge waggonette for Copperhouse
Cross,--a meet that was suspiciously near to the Duke's fatal wood.
Spooner had explained to Phineas over night that they never did draw
Trumpeton Wood on Copperhouse Cross days, and that under no possible
circumstances would Chiltern now draw Trumpeton Wood. But there is
no saying where a fox may run. At this time of the year, just the
beginning of February, dog-foxes from the big woods were very apt
to be away from home, and when found would go straight for their
own earths. It was very possible that they might find themselves in
Trumpeton Wood, and then certainly there would be a row. Spooner
shrugged his shoulders, and shook his head, and seemed to insinuate
that Lord Chiltern would certainly do something very dreadful to the
Duke or to the Duke's heir if any law of venery should again be found
to have been broken on this occasion.
The distance to Copperhouse Cross was twelve miles, and Phineas found
himself placed in the carriage next to Madame Goesler. It had not
been done of fixed design; but when a party of six are seated in a
carriage, the chances are that one given person will be next to or
opposite to any other given person. Madame Max had remembered this,
and had prepared herself, but Phineas was taken aback when he found
how close was his neighbourhood to the lady. "Get in, Phineas," said
his lordship. Gerard Maule had already seated himself next to Miss
Palliser, and Phineas had no alternative but to take the place next
to Madame Max.
"I didn't know that you rode to hounds?" said Phineas.
"Oh, yes; I have done so for years. When we met it was always in
London, Mr. Finn; and people there never know what other people do.
Have you heard of this terrible affair about the Duke?"
"Oh, dear, yes."
"Poor Duke! He and I have seen a great deal of each other
since,--since the days when you and I used to meet. He knows nothing
about all this, and the worst of it is, he is not in a condition to
be told."
"Lady Glencora could put it all right."
"I'll tell Lady Glencora, of course," said Madame Max. "It seems so
odd in this country that the owner of a property does not seem at all
to have any exclusive right to it. I suppose the Duke could shut up
the wood if he liked."
"But they poisoned the hounds."
"Nobody supposes the Duke did that,--or even the Duke's servants, I
should think. But Lord Chiltern will hear us if we don't take care."
"I've heard every word you've been saying," exclaimed Lord Chiltern.
"Has it been traced to any one?"
"No,--not traced, I suppose."
"What then, Lord Chiltern? You may speak out to me. When I'm wrong I
like to be told so."
"Then you're wrong now," said Lord Chiltern, "if you take the part of
the Duke or of any of his people. He is bound to find foxes for the
Brake hunt. It is almost a part of his title deeds. Instead of doing
so he has had them destroyed."
"It's as bad as voting against the Church establishment," said Madame
Goesler.
There was a very large meet at Copperhouse Cross, and both Madame
Goesler and Phineas Finn found many old acquaintances there. As
Phineas had formerly sat in the House for five years, and had been
in office, and had never made himself objectionable either to his
friends or adversaries, he had been widely known. He now found half
a dozen men who were always members of Parliament,--men who seem,
though commoners, to have been born legislators,--who all spoke to
him as though his being member for Tankerville and hunting with the
Brake hounds were equally matters of course. They knew him, but they
knew nothing of the break in his life. Or if they remembered that he
had not been seen about the House for the last two or three years
they remembered also that accidents do happen to some men. It will
occur now and again that a regular denizen of Westminster will get
a fall in the political hunting-field, and have to remain about the
world for a year or two without a seat. That Phineas had lately
triumphed over Browborough at Tankerville was known, the event
having been so recent; and men congratulated him, talking of poor
Browborough,--whose heavy figure had been familiar to them for many
a year,--but by no means recognising that the event of which they
spoke had been, as it were, life and death to their friend. Roby was
there, who was at this moment Mr. Daubeny's head whip and patronage
secretary. If any one should have felt acutely the exclusion of Mr.
Browborough from the House,--any one beyond the sufferer himself,--it
should have been Mr. Roby; but he made himself quite pleasant, and
even condescended to be jocose upon the occasion. "So you've beat
poor Browborough in his own borough," said Mr. Roby.
"I've beat him," said Phineas; "but not, I hope, in a borough of his
own."
"He's been there for the last fifteen years. Poor old fellow! He's
awfully cut up about this Church Question. I shouldn't have thought
he'd have taken anything so much to heart. There are worse fellows
than Browborough, let me tell you. What's all this I hear about the
Duke poisoning the foxes?" But the crowd had begun to move, and
Phineas was not called upon to answer the question.
Copperhouse Cross in the Brake Hunt was a very popular meet. It
was easily reached by a train from London, was in the centre of an
essentially hunting country, was near to two or three good coverts,
and was in itself a pretty spot. Two roads intersected each other on
the middle of Copperhouse Common, which, as all the world knows, lies
just on the outskirts of Copperhouse Forest. A steep winding hill
leads down from the Wood to the Cross, and there is no such thing
within sight as an enclosure. At the foot of the hill, running under
the wooden bridge, straggles the Copperhouse Brook,--so called by the
hunting men of the present day, though men who know the country of
old, or rather the county, will tell you that it is properly called
the river Cobber, and that the spacious old farm buildings above
were once known as the Cobber Manor House. He would be a vain man
who would now try to change the name, as Copperhouse Cross has been
printed in all the lists of hunting meets for at least the last
thirty years; and the Ordnance map has utterly rejected the two b's.
Along one of the cross-roads there was a broad extent of common, some
seven or eight hundred yards in length, on which have been erected
the butts used by those well-known defenders of their country, the
Copperhouse Volunteer Rifles; and just below the bridge the sluggish
water becomes a little lake, having probably at some time been
artificially widened, and there is a little island and a decoy for
ducks. On the present occasion carriages were drawn up on all the
roads, and horses were clustered on each side of the brook, and the
hounds sat stately on their haunches where riflemen usually kneel to
fire, and there was a hum of merry voices, and the bright colouring
of pink coats, and the sheen of ladies' hunting toilettes, and that
mingled look of business and amusement which is so peculiar to our
national sports. Two hundred men and women had come there for the
chance of a run after a fox,--for a chance against which the odds are
more than two to one at every hunting day,--for a chance as to which
the odds are twenty to one against the success of the individuals
collected; and yet, for every horseman and every horsewoman there,
not less than £5 a head will have been spent for this one day's
amusement. When we give a guinea for a stall at the opera we think
that we pay a large sum; but we are fairly sure of having our music.
When you go to Copperhouse Cross you are by no means sure of your
opera.
Why is it that when men and women congregate, though the men may beat
the women in numbers by ten to one, and though they certainly speak
the louder, the concrete sound that meets the ears of any outside
listener is always a sound of women's voices? At Copperhouse Cross
almost every one was talking, but the feeling left upon the senses
was that of an amalgam of feminine laughter, feminine affectation,
and feminine eagerness. Perhaps at Copperhouse Cross the determined
perseverance with which Lady Gertrude Fitzaskerley addressed herself
to Lord Chiltern, to Cox the huntsman, to the two whips, and at
last to Mr. Spooner, may have specially led to the remark on this
occasion. Lord Chiltern was very short with her, not loving Lady
Gertrude. Cox bestowed upon her two "my lady's," and then turned from
her to some peccant hound. But Spooner was partly gratified, and
partly incapable, and underwent a long course of questions about
the Duke and the poisoning. Lady Gertrude, whose father seemed to
have owned half the coverts in Ireland, had never before heard of
such enormity. She suggested a round robin and would not be at all
ashamed to put her own name to it. "Oh, for the matter of that," said
Spooner, "Chiltern can be round enough himself without any robin."
"He can't be too round," said Lady Gertrude, with a very serious
aspect.
At last they moved away, and Phineas found himself riding by the side
of Madame Goesler. It was natural that he should do so, as he had
come with her. Maule had, of course, remained with Miss Palliser,
and Chiltern and Spooner had taken themselves to their respective
duties. Phineas might have avoided her, but in doing so he would have
seemed to avoid her. She accepted his presence apparently as a matter
of course, and betrayed by her words and manner no memory of past
scenes. It was not customary with them to draw the forest, which
indeed, as it now stood, was a forest only in name, and they trotted
off to a gorse a mile and a half distant. This they drew blank,--then
another gorse also blank,--and two or three little fringes of wood,
such as there are in every country, and through which huntsmen run
their hounds, conscious that no fox will lie there. At one o'clock
they had not found, and the hilarity of the really hunting men as
they ate their sandwiches and lit their cigars was on the decrease.
The ladies talked more than ever, Lady Gertrude's voice was heard
above them all, and Lord Chiltern trotted on close behind his hounds
in obdurate silence. When things were going bad with him no one in
the field dared to speak to him.
Phineas had never seen his horse till he reached the meet, and there
found a fine-looking, very strong, bay animal, with shoulders like
the top of a hay-stack, short-backed, short-legged, with enormous
quarters, and a wicked-looking eye. "He ought to be strong," said
Phineas to the groom. "Oh, sir; strong ain't no word for him," said
the groom; "'e can carry a 'ouse." "I don't know whether he's fast?"
inquired Phineas. "He's fast enough for any 'ounds, sir," said the
man with that tone of assurance which always carries conviction. "And
he can jump?" "He can jump!" continued the groom; "no 'orse in my
lord's stables can't beat him." "But he won't?" said Phineas. "It's
only sometimes, sir, and then the best thing is to stick him at it
till he do. He'll go, he will, like a shot at last; and then he's
right for the day." Hunting men will know that all this was not quite
comfortable. When you ride your own horse, and know his special
defects, you know also how far that defect extends, and what real
prospect you have of overcoming it. If he be slow through the mud,
you keep a good deal on the road in heavy weather, and resolve that
the present is not an occasion for distinguishing yourself. If he be
bad at timber, you creep through a hedge. If he pulls, you get as far
from the crowd as may be. You gauge your misfortune, and make your
little calculation as to the best mode of remedying the evil. But
when you are told that your friend's horse is perfect,--only that he
does this or that,--there comes a weight on your mind from which you
are unable to release it. You cannot discount your trouble at any
percentage. It may amount to absolute ruin, as far as that day is
concerned; and in such a circumstance you always look forward to
the worst. When the groom had done his description, Phineas Finn
would almost have preferred a day's canvass at Tankerville under Mr.
Ruddles's authority to his present position.
When the hounds entered Broughton Spinnies, Phineas and Madame
Goesler were still together. He had not been riding actually at her
side all the morning. Many men and two or three ladies had been
talking to her. But he had never been far from her in the ruck, and
now he was again close by her horse's head. Broughton Spinnies were
in truth a series of small woods, running one into another almost
without intermission, never thick, and of no breadth. There was
always a litter or two of cubs at the place, and in no part of the
Brake country was greater care taken in the way of preservation and
encouragement to interesting vixens; but the lying was bad; there was
little or no real covert; and foxes were very apt to travel and get
away into those big woods belonging to the Duke,--where, as the Brake
sportsmen now believed, they would almost surely come to an untimely
end. "If we draw this blank I don't know what we are to do," said Mr.
Spooner, addressing himself to Madame Goesler with lachrymose
anxiety.
"Have you nothing else to draw?" asked Phineas.
"In the common course of things we should take Muggery Gorse, and so
on to Trumpeton Wood. But Muggery is on the Duke's land, and Chiltern
is in such a fix! He won't go there unless he can't help it. Muggery
Gorse is only a mile this side of the big wood."
"And foxes of course go to the big wood?" asked Madame Max.
"Not always. They often come here,--and as they can't hang here, we
have the whole country before us. We get as good runs from Muggery as
from any covert in the country. But Chiltern won't go there to-day
unless the hounds show a line. By George, that's a fox! That's Dido.
That's a find!" And Spooner galloped away, as though Dido could do
nothing with the fox she had found unless he was there to help her.
Spooner was quite right, as he generally was on such occasions. He
knew the hounds even by voice, and knew what hound he could believe.
Most hounds will lie occasionally, but Dido never lied. And there
were many besides Spooner who believed in Dido. The whole pack rushed
to her music, though the body of them would have remained utterly
unmoved at the voice of any less reverenced and less trustworthy
colleague. The whole wood was at once in commotion,--men and women
riding hither and thither, not in accordance with any judgment; but
as they saw or thought they saw others riding who were supposed to
have judgment. To get away well is so very much! And to get away well
is often so very difficult! There are so many things of which the
horseman is bound to think in that moment. Which way does the wind
blow? And then, though a fox will not long run up wind, he will break
covert up wind, as often as not. From which of the various rides
can you find a fair exit into the open country, without a chance of
breaking your neck before the run begins? When you hear some wild
halloa, informing you that one fox has gone in the direction exactly
opposite to that in which the hounds are hunting, are you sure that
the noise is not made about a second fox? On all these matters you
are bound to make up your mind without losing a moment; and if you
make up your mind wrongly the five pounds you have invested in that
day's amusement will have been spent for nothing. Phineas and Madame
Goesler were in the very centre of the wood when Spooner rushed away
from them down one of the rides on hearing Dido's voice; and at
that time they were in a crowd. Almost immediately the fox was seen
to cross another ride, and a body of horsemen rushed away in that
direction, knowing that the covert was small, and there the animal
must soon leave the wood. Then there was a shout of "Away!" repeated
over and over again, and Lord Chiltern, running up like a flash of
lightning, and passing our two friends, galloped down a third ride
to the right of the others. Phineas at once followed the master of
the pack, and Madame Goesler followed Phineas. Men were still riding
hither and thither; and a farmer, meeting them, with his horse turned
back towards the centre of the wood which they were leaving, halloaed
out as they passed that there was no way out at the bottom. They met
another man in pink, who screamed out something as to "the devil of a
bank down there." Chiltern, however, was still going on, and our hero
had not the heart to stop his horse in its gallop and turn back from
the direction in which the hounds were running. At that moment he
hardly remembered the presence of Madame Goesler, but he did remember
every word that had been said to him about Dandolo. He did not in the
least doubt but that Chiltern had chosen his direction rightly, and
that if he were once out of the wood he would find himself with the
hounds; but what if this brute should refuse to take him out of the
wood? That Dandolo was very fast he soon became aware, for he gained
upon his friend before him as they neared the fence. And then he saw
what there was before him. A new broad ditch had been cut, with the
express object of preventing egress or ingress at that point; and a
great bank had been constructed with the clay. In all probability
there might be another ditch on the other side. Chiltern, however,
had clearly made up his mind about it. The horse he was riding went
at it gallantly, cleared the first ditch, balanced himself for half a
moment on the bank, and then, with a fresh spring, got into the field
beyond. The tail hounds were running past outside the covert, and the
master had placed himself exactly right for the work in hand. How
excellent would be the condition of Finn if only Dandolo would do
just as Chiltern's horse had done before him!
And Phineas almost began to hope that it might be so. The horse was
going very well, and very willingly. His head was stretched out, he
was pulling, not more, however, than pleasantly, and he seemed to
be as anxious as his rider. But there was a little twitch about his
ears which his rider did not like, and then it was impossible not to
remember that awful warning given by the groom, "It's only sometimes,
sir." And after what fashion should Phineas ride him at the obstacle?
He did not like to strike a horse that seemed to be going well, and
was unwilling, as are all good riders, to use his heels. So he spoke
to him, and proposed to lift him at the ditch. To the very edge the
horse galloped,--too fast, indeed, if he meant to take the bank as
Chiltern's horse had done,--and then stopping himself so suddenly
that he must have shaken every joint in his body, he planted his
fore feet on the very brink, and there he stood, with his head down,
quivering in every muscle. Phineas Finn, following naturally the
momentum which had been given to him, went over the brute's neck
head-foremost into the ditch. Madame Max was immediately off her
horse. "Oh, Mr. Finn, are you hurt?"
But Phineas, happily, was not hurt. He was shaken and dirty, but not
so shaken, and not so dirty, but that he was on his legs in a minute,
imploring his companion not to mind him but go on. "Going on doesn't
seem to be so easy," said Madame Goesler, looking at the ditch as she
held her horse in her hand. But to go back in such circumstances is a
terrible disaster. It amounts to complete defeat; and is tantamount
to a confession that you must go home, because you are unable to ride
to hounds. A man, when he is compelled to do this, is almost driven
to resolve at the spur of the moment that he will give up hunting for
the rest of his life. And if one thing be more essential than any
other to the horseman in general, it is that he, and not the animal
which he rides, shall be the master. "The best thing is to stick him
at it till he do," the groom had said; and Phineas resolved to be
guided by the groom.
But his first duty was to attend on Madame Goesler. With very little
assistance she was again in her saddle, and she at once declared
herself certain that her horse could take the fence. Phineas again
instantly jumped into his saddle, and turning Dandolo again at the
ditch, rammed the rowels into the horse's sides. But Dandolo would
not jump yet. He stood with his fore feet on the brink, and when
Phineas with his whip struck him severely over the shoulders, he went
down into the ditch on all fours, and then scrambled back again to
his former position. "What an infernal brute!" said Phineas, gnashing
his teeth.
"He is a little obstinate, Mr. Finn; I wonder whether he'd jump if
I gave him a lead." But Phineas was again making the attempt, urging
the horse with spurs, whip, and voice. He had brought himself now
to that condition in which a man is utterly reckless as to falling
himself,--or even to the kind of fall he may get,--if he can only
force his animal to make the attempt. But Dandolo would not make
the attempt. With ears down and head outstretched, he either stuck
obstinately on the brink, or allowed himself to be forced again and
again into the ditch. "Let me try it once, Mr. Finn," said Madame
Goesler in her quiet way.
She was riding a small horse, very nearly thoroughbred, and known
as a perfect hunter by those who habitually saw Madame Goesler ride.
No doubt he would have taken the fence readily enough had his rider
followed immediately after Lord Chiltern; but Dandolo had baulked at
the fence nearly a dozen times, and evil communications will corrupt
good manners. Without any show of violence, but still with persistent
determination, Madame Goesler's horse also declined to jump. She put
him at it again and again, and he would make no slightest attempt to
do his business. Phineas raging, fuming, out of breath, miserably
unhappy, shaking his reins, plying his whip, rattling himself about
in the saddle, and banging his legs against the horse's sides, again
and again plunged away at the obstacle. But it was all to no purpose.
Dandolo was constantly in the ditch, sometimes lying with his side
against the bank, and had now been so hustled and driven that, had he
been on the other side, he would have had no breath left to carry his
rider, even in the ruck of the hunt. In the meantime the hounds and
the leading horsemen were far away,--never more to be seen on that
day by either Phineas Finn or Madame Max Goesler. For a while, during
the frantic efforts that were made, an occasional tardy horseman was
viewed galloping along outside the covert, following the tracks of
those who had gone before. But before the frantic efforts had been
abandoned as utterly useless every vestige of the morning's work
had left the neighbourhood of Broughton Spinnies, except these two
unfortunate ones. At last it was necessary that the defeat should be
acknowledged. "We're beaten, Madame Goesler," said Phineas, almost in
tears.
"Altogether beaten, Mr. Finn."
"I've a good mind to swear that I'll never come out hunting again."
"Swear what you like, if it will relieve you, only don't think of
keeping such an oath. I've known you before this to be depressed by
circumstances quite as distressing as these, and to be certain that
all hope was over;--but yet you have recovered." This was the only
allusion she had yet made to their former acquaintance. "And now we
must think of getting out of the wood."
"I haven't the slightest idea of the direction of anything."
"Nor have I; but as we clearly can't get out this way we might as
well try the other. Come along. We shall find somebody to put us in
the right road. For my part I'm glad it is no worse. I thought at one
time that you were going to break your neck." They rode on for a few
minutes in silence, and then she spoke again. "Is it not odd, Mr.
Finn, that after all that has come and gone you and I should find
ourselves riding about Broughton Spinnies together?"