For which I kissed them both, because they were so femininely
consistent.
The truth is, I wanted to go hunting. It was in my blood that morning,
and these beautiful December days with a hazy glow on the blue hills and
that stillness that comes like a dropping nut in a forest would put it
into anybody's blood, anybody who had it. And when the infection hits
you there is only one antidote, a dog, a gun, a tramp over the hills,
and--whir! bang! bang!
And to-day was ideal. I had felt it all morning; the cool, bracing air
with that little frosty aroma of leaves curling to crispness under the
first blight of things, and that other delightful odor of pungent
woodland damp with frost-biting dew. And the hills blue and beautiful
are alone worth going to meet, and the trees crimson in the hectic flush
of the dying year.
Dick, my pointer, was jumping all over me and turning dogsprings of
delight.
"Down, Dick! Heigh ho, old boy; that machine is against my religion,
but I'd go hunting in a negro hearse to-day. Besides," I said, with a
twinge of conscience, "he'll get us to the field in forty minutes, and
the little mare is getting old and we've got a late start."
I sighed and felt better. I had fought so long and said so much for the
horse, and now--now--it was inexorable; they were being driven to their
fate; they had to go before the relentless wheel of progress. I was
virtually admitting it, I, who had said I'd never--