Katerfelto Part 23

John Garnet, speeding away in front, on excellent terms with the hounds, and as happy as a king, little thought of the malice and hatred following in his track, little thought, indeed, of anything--unless it were Nelly Carew's blue eyes--but the keen enjoyment of his favourite pursuit. He was far too practised a horseman, however, to forget in his enthusiasm the normal rules of his art, and reflected more than once that although he had never ridden an animal to be compared with him, yet Katerfelto was but a horse after all, and so far like other horses that at last his long powerful gallop must come to an end. Therefore he spared him as much as was compatible with his resolution not to leave the hounds, and kept his eye forward with considerable judgment and sagacity, so that when opportunity offered he might never throw a chance away.

Thus, while the pack, guided by Tancred's grandson, who bore the imposing name of Thunderer, dived into a precipitous ravine, he rode judiciously along its edge, and pulled his horse into a trot, while he watched them swarming and bustling through the gigantic growth of heather that fringed several hundred feet of an almost perpendicular incline. From thence he scanned the ground in front to find a more practicable descent, and down it he plunged without hesitation so soon as the hounds, giving tongue freely, dashed into the water below. It was a shallow, darkling stream, breaking and brawling over ledges of granite between high, steep banks, clothed in tangled underwood, and John Garnet could not but hope that now the deer had taken soil, and soon would burst on his ear that loud and welcome chorus called the "bay." It disappointed him a little to observe the pack cross the stream, borne downward by its current, wading, swimming, shaking their ears and sides, while Thunderer informed them loudly that he was in possession of the scent.

It disappointed him still more when the grey horse had splashed and struggled through from bank to bank, that the hounds, whose noses had never yet been off the line for an instant, should be looking about them on the further side with heads up and wistful faces gazing in his own as though half ashamed of failure, half pleading for a.s.sistance. There was no doubt they had come to a check, and appealed to the horseman for help he was unable to afford. The ground rose steep and high, the darkling copse that clothed these abrupt hill-sides shut out the light of day.

John Garnet was at a loss. Had the deer lain down? or was it forward still, and in which direction? He naturally looked for Tancred to inform him, but Tancred was nowhere to be seen.

The Parson, meanwhile, labouring doggedly on, had caught a distant glimpse of the hounds even as they disappeared over the brink of this precipitous coombe, in time to play a bold stroke that merited success.

He determined not to cross the valley at all, but to steer for that side of it on which the line of chase now seemed to lie, and so hoped to come in on the deer, refreshed by the bath he never doubted it had indulged in, as it rose the hill once more and made for the open moor. Urging Ca.s.sock to further effort, he increased the pace for a stretch of another mile, but when he halted his good horse--who stopped willingly enough at the wished-for station--not a living object was to be seen dotting the brown expanse, not a sound to be heard but the wail of the curlew flitting softly over the waste. Deer and hounds and John Garnet must have sunk into the earth! The solitude seemed unbroken, the chase had come to a standstill, and the Parson was at fault!

CHAPTER XXIV.

AT BAY.

Tancred, a marvel of canine sagacity, had good reason for deserting his comrades, to engage in some quiet researches of his own. It is unnecessary to inform those who love stag-hunting--and those who do not will hardly care to learn--that scent often hangs over running water, and travels downwards with the moving stream; therefore the deer, wading craftily towards the river's source, emerged on its farther bank, refreshed and strengthened by the bath, at some considerable distance above the place where it plunged in. Such tactics were only in accordance with the calculation and reflection we call _instinct_; but Tancred was possessed of _instinct_ too, and remembered, no doubt, many a cast he had made on similar occasions with successful result. The old hound, therefore, a.s.suming an expression of ludicrous solemnity, dashed through the water, to enter without delay, on a close scrutiny of his own, along the opposite bank, in the reverse direction from that mistaken line on which his grandson was insisting with unbecoming clamour, and snuffled at every pebble, poked his black nose into every tuft of brushwood, gra.s.s, or heather he came across. Soon, with a flap of his pendant ears, a lash of his stern against his mighty ribs, up went the wise and handsome head in a roar of triumph--a roar that, for the first, struck terror to the red-deer's heart, some furlongs on in front--a roar that brought the old hound's comrades to his side, with an alacrity sufficiently denoting how, by the best of all judges, this lord of the kennel was trusted and revered.

"He's forward!" exclaimed John Garnet, plunging through briar and brushwood, with the rein on Katerfelto's neck. "Hold up, old man! we shall soon be in the open again; and, by George, this is the best run you or I ever saw in our lives."

These words of encouragement were addressed by the rider to his horse, as the latter scrambled sideways up a bank that would have taxed the agility of a goat. Gaining the top they were rewarded by a spectacle that seemed equally to the taste of each. Through an open wood of grand old oaks, standing wide apart, ran twenty couple of powerful stag-hounds, majestic in shape, gigantic in stature, deep and rich in colour, stringing somewhat, it may be, as they pa.s.sed in and out the gnarled substantial stems, but shaking the very acorns from the autumn boughs above, as that leafy canopy trembled to the music of their full sonorous cry. Katerfelto's neck swelled with delight, while he reached at his bridle for liberty to go faster still. The sunbeams broke and sparkled overhead amongst the flickering green, the waving ferns lowered their banners in graceful homage as they bent and yielded underfoot, the dark moor, visible here and there through the trees, stretched to the horizon in front. The whole pageant seemed too beautiful for reality, and John Garnet felt as if he were hunting in a dream.

Emerging once more on the open, he found he was no longer alone with the hounds. "That must be a good black horse," he said to himself, and thought no more about it; for although, as a stranger in the county, he believed the run to have been perfectly straight, he was no ungenerous rival, and felt rather gratified that his pleasure should be shared by one who could appreciate its charm. He might want a.s.sistance too, he reflected, at the finish; for to kill a stag at bay, and rescue his carcase from the fangs of a pack of hounds, however tired, that had "set him up," was no pleasant job to undertake single-handed in the wilds of Devon. Therefore he greeted the appearance of Parson Gale, galloping steadily towards him, with an encouraging wave of the arm, and a jolly cheer.

The Parson's knowledge of wood-craft had served him at last. Of the few turns the deer made out of its direct line, this at least had been in his favour. It was in a strange tumult of mingled exultation and malignity, that he now found himself almost within speaking distance of his rival, well within hearing of the hounds. "It must soon be over,"

thought the Parson, "and he shall not boast he rode clean away from Abner Gale after all! Anyhow, Master Garnet, the deer cannot surely travel much farther, and then comes the reckoning between you and me."

But one notable peculiarity of this wild stag-hunting in the West, is the impossibility of calculating on the endurance of a red-deer. A light young hart, four or five years old, unenc.u.mbered by flesh, and with the elasticity of youth in every limb, can naturally skim the surface of his native wastes like a creature with wings; but it is strange, that on occasion, though rarely, a stag should be found with branching antlers to prove his maturity, and broad well-furnished back to denote his weight, that can yet stand before a pack of hounds, toiling after him at steady three-quarter speed, over every kind of ground, for twenty, and even thirty miles on end. We can gauge to a nicety the lasting qualities of our horse--we have a shrewd guess at about what stage of the proceedings even such staunch hounds as Tancred and Tarquin must begin to flag; but the powers of a hunted stag defy speculation, or as old Rube observed, in his more sober and reflective moments, "'Tis a creatur three parts con-trairiness and only a quarter venison. Why, even I can't always tell ye where to vind 'un, nor which road he'll think well to travel, nor how fur he'll go. Them as made 'un knows, I'll warrant; but there's many a deer lies in the forest, as is one too many for Red Rube!"

It may be that the breeze was from the north, bringing with it the keen salt savour of the sea; it may be that the deer, reckoning up its remaining strength, felt unable to traverse all that width of broken country which must intervene, ere it could reach the sheltering heights of Seven Ash, or the dark gorge that shuts in Combe-Martin Cove, between the cliffs; for turning short to the right, it set its head resolutely upward, and the pace became more severe with every stride. The line too was exceedingly trying to hounds and horses, from the undulating nature of the ground, intersected at every mile with deep and narrow coombes--unseen, till it was too late, by judicious coasting, to avoid their laborious steeps. Up and down these the deer travelled obliquely, using the broken sheep-tracks that afforded but little foothold to a hound, and none whatever to a horse. Katerfelto began to lean on his bridle, and Ca.s.sock, following at a respectful distance, relapsed into a trot. Their riders also wished from their hearts that the thing would come to an end. There is but little satisfaction in the finest run on record if, spite of troubles, triumphs, pains, and perils, we never get to the finish after all.

But to one individual the turn thus taken at so critical a period of the chase was welcomed with exceeding grat.i.tude and delight. Red Rube, on the broken-kneed pony, had hung perseveringly on the line instinct rather than experience prompted him to adopt. Steadily adhering to his western course, and keeping the high ground, he was fortunate enough to hit on the chord of the arc, and travelled less than a mile for every two covered by the chase. Therefore, halting above the green slopes of Paracombe to listen, his ears tingled, and his heart thrilled while he caught the dear familiar cry. "They do run ov 'un still!" exclaimed the old man, his grey eye sparkling, and the colour rising in his wrinkled cheek; "and they do come nigher momently, for sure. He do mean 'soilin'

in the Lynn, I'll warrant, but they'll set him up this side Waters-meet, I'll wager a gallon!" Then he consulted that elaborate map of the country he carried in his head, and admonished the broken-kneed pony with a touch of his single spur.

Now, Red Rube's proficiency in stag-hunting and Parson Gale's only differed in degree, nor was the divine very far behind the harbourer in knowledge of their favourite pursuit. He too, could make his guess at the probable termination of the run, and husbanded Ca.s.sock's powers to the utmost, with shrewd misgivings, lest his horse should prove unable to outlast the deer.

Yes, the good stag must falter and fail ere long. His russet hide is blackened now with sweat and mire, his eye starts wild and blood-shot from his reeking head; he stops more than once to take breath and listen, but toiling on again labours heavily in his gait, and sways from side to side. Facing a steep hill, he b.r.e.a.s.t.s it gallantly, and for the first time since he left his harbour, scales the ascent in a direct line for the top. Parson Gale, a mile behind, catches a glimpse of him in the act, and plies his spurs freely, for he knows that now the game is played out.

[Ill.u.s.tration: BEAT!]

[Ill.u.s.tration: SET UP!]

John Garnet too, who obtains a nearer view, is not surprised to see the stag come faintly back, ere he has mounted half-way up, and plunge downward into a thickly-wooded valley, dark and silent, but for the brawling of a distant torrent in its depths. Cras.h.i.+ng through the leafy underwood with a cry that grows louder, fiercer, and yet more musical, as they come nearer and nearer their game, Thunderer, Tarquin, Tancred, and the rest, dash eagerly forward, with flaming eyes, impatient of delay, and heads flung up at frequent intervals, as each hound catches its ravis.h.i.+ng particles, and owns the transport afforded by the scent of a sinking deer. Crossing and recrossing the stream downwards, always downwards, they plunge and splash through the water, on the track of their prey, rousing the echoes with a yell and chorus that announce their certain triumph, and cruel thirst for blood.

Nearer, clearer, deadlier, every moment, it rouses all the red deer's instincts of courage and defiance. If fight he must, he will fight at the best advantage and to the bitter end! His pitiless foes are not a hundred paces off, not twenty, not ten. But for a bound those failing limbs could only make in extremity of despair, they must have been upon him now, and would have got him down, had he not leaped out of their very jaws, to a ledge of water-worn granite, whence he slips deftly into a pool that reaches his brisket, and takes up a position of defence, with his back to an overhanging rock.

Right well he knows the advantage of standing firm on his legs, while his a.s.sailants must swim to the attack; and, lowering his head, delivers the thrusts of those formidable antlers with deadly effect. Hound after hound dashes in for the death-grapple, only to turn aside, worsted, if not overcome. Tarquin and Tancred, swimming warily out of distance, are watching their opportunity; and Thunderer, seamed from shoulder to flank, dripping with blood and water, bays wrathfully from the sh.o.r.e.

Facing his death in the deep wild glades and rocky glens of beautiful Waters-meet, the stag seems undaunted still and undefeated, as when fresh from his leafy lair, bold and triumphant, he spurned the red mountain heather on the moor by Cloutsham Ball.

Admiration, dashed with pity, thrills John Garnet's heart, while he contemplates the n.o.ble creature thus defending himself, like a true knight, against overwhelming odds; but the hunter's instinct of destruction rises paramount, and, leaping lightly from his horse, he scrambles over the wet and slippery boulders, with some vague notion of affording a.s.sistance to the hounds.

It is not till he gains the rock beneath which the deer has taken refuge, and comes near enough to touch the animal with his whip, that he realises his own helplessness. He carries no hunting-knife, and his only weapons, a brace of horse-pistols, are safe in Katerfelto's holsters, a hundred yards above him in the wood.

But Abner Gale is not thus to be caught at a disadvantage, and unarmed.

He too has dismounted; and, rather from instinct than reflection, runs in behind the quarry, with eight inches of bare steel in his hand. The Parson is an adept in all ceremonies of the chase, and no man knows better how to administer its death-stroke to a hunted deer.

The roar of the torrent, the continuous baying of the pack, drown all other noises; and John Garnet, stooping over the stag, while considering whether he shall noose the beast in his whip, and try to hold it till a.s.sistance arrives, little thinks so fierce an enemy stands behind him, with his arm up to strike!

Now, it is but justice to say, that the Parson, running in upon the red-deer thus "set-up," and holding its own against the hounds, was wholly moved by the force of habit and the instincts of his craft. He, too, had pressed forward when he heard "the bay," and, leaving Ca.s.sock beside the grey horse, had rushed down with all the speed his heavy riding-boots permitted, to cut the stag's throat from behind.

It was only when he looked from that hated rival, unconscious of his presence, and within arm's length, to the steel in his hand, that the hideous temptation came upon him; and while the sky seemed turning crimson, and the river running blood, through the stupefying roar of the water and deafening clamour of the hounds, a whisper from h.e.l.l, in the Tempter's own voice, bade him "Slay! slay!--Smite and spare not!"

Men undergo strange experiences at such moments, and live a long time in the dealing of a thrust, or the drawing of a trigger! Parson Gale, glancing wildly round, believed that no human eye was on his movements, believed that, save for himself and his victim, the solitude was unbroken by human presence, believed that the devil in person was at hand to help him in his crime, and that this h.e.l.lish tinge of crimson colouring sky and wood and water was a reflection from his wings!

His eye had already marked the spot where, between the shoulders of that laced hunting-coat, he could plant a blow that should pierce the very heart. He nerved himself, set his teeth, and raised his hand.

One convulsive effort of the braced sinews, one flash of the descending steel, a choking sob, a gasping cry, a hoa.r.s.e rattle of the hard-drawn parting breath, and all would have been over; but even while the knife quivered in air, John Garnet turned his head, leaped to his feet, and caught his enemy by the wrist.

A yell of rage from the grey stallion, jealous of Ca.s.sock's approach, and rearing on end for an unprovoked a.s.sault, attracted his attention and saved his rider's life.

The green leaves s.h.i.+ning in the sun wove bowers of Fairyland overhead, the torrent plunged, and roared, and tumbled in foaming eddies round that translucent pool, s.h.i.+ning like silver through the dark tangled beauties of wooded Waters-meet.

Above stood two strong men, rigid, motionless as statues for the s.p.a.ce of a full minute, locked in each other's grasp, and below, leaping, swimming, das.h.i.+ng, retreating, traversing to and fro, the n.o.blest pack of hounds in Europe clamoured round the stag at bay!

CHAPTER XXV.

A BROAD HINT.

"Hold on, Parson! you've been and dropped your knife!" said a rough voice in Abner Gale's ear, while a dexterous s.n.a.t.c.h twitched the weapon out of his fingers. "Shame! gentlemen, shame!" continued Red Rube--for it was none other than the harbourer, who thus struggled up in the nick of time--"that two such n.o.ble riders should dispute about the honour of blooding a pack of hounds!"

Then stooping nimbly down, and seizing its branching antlers with one hand, while with the other he drew the Parson's hunting-knife across the stag's throat, he observed that in the huntsman's absence it was a harbourer's right to administer its death-stroke to the deer. Slowly, proudly, the stately creature's head drooped to the level of those eddying waters, already mantling in crimson circles with its blood.

Fiercely, savagely, maddened by the work of slaughter, leaping and tumbling over each other in their eagerness to tear their prey, the hounds threw themselves on the carcase, and it required the efforts of all three men to preserve it from being foully mangled in their fangs.

Side by side, in silence, yet a.s.sisting each other and Red Rube, with all their skill in wood-craft, the foes who had but now been grappling in a death struggle, drew ash.o.r.e, dismembered, and disembowelled the dead stag, as if their only consideration were the authorised distribution of its venison, and proper recompense of the hounds with blood.

It was not till the prescribed obsequies were fulfilled, till lights and liver had been set aside, the head sawn off, the "slot," or forefoot, carefully severed for preservation, in memorial of so fine a run, the paunch swallowed in eager gulps by the famished hounds, while Tancred and Thunderer growled at the two ends of a yard of entrails, and Red Rube, with bare, blood-stained arms, wiped the Parson's knife on a tuft of gra.s.s, but forbore returning it to its owner, that John Garnet, finding a moment's leisure, observed how three or four of the most fortunate riders had arrived, as though dropped from the clouds, in time to witness the finish before all was over. Amongst them he looked in vain for the pretty white pony and Nelly Carew.

In the congratulations exchanged, the ebullitions of excitement indulged in by these triumphant sportsmen, the Parson's moody scowl escaped remark, save by one, whose whole life was spent in noting these trifling signs by which important results are indicated to the observing. Red Rube drew his own conclusions from the att.i.tude in which he found those two foremost riders at the crowning catastrophe of the chase, and was satisfied, while he marked his sullen glances and vindictive brow, that the Parson entertained some deeper and deadlier grudge against the more successful sportsman than could arise from a mere question of priority in cutting the deer's throat.

Now, Red Rube knew Abner Gale's character as well as he knew the surface of Exmoor Forest, and wanted none to tell him that the Parson's hatred meant persecution, by all means, fair and foul, even unto death! To John Garnet the harbourer had taken one of those fancies so often entertained by the old for those who might be their grandsons. He liked the young man's pleasant face and frank kindly manners; his enthusiasm for the chase; above all, his skill in the saddle and daring style of horsemans.h.i.+p; nor thought him less deserving because of a shrewd suspicion that he was the identical highwayman for whose capture a reward of one hundred guineas had been offered by his Sovereign Lord the King. Therefore--and it shows how high John Garnet must have stood in his opinion--Rube refrained from giving information of his hiding-place, and claiming that large sum of money for himself. Therefore, also, he determined that, so far as he could prevent it, the Parson should do no mischief to this promising young stag-hunter; whom, moreover, he highly admired for his recklessness in thus appearing openly while so high a price was on his head. In short, he loved his new acquaintance better than his old friend and fellow-sportsman, better even--and it is saying a great deal--than one hundred guineas in gold!

It is needless to observe that of those who reached the finish at Waters-meet before the "bay" was over, Abel the huntsman arrived first, making his appearance, indeed, immediately after Rube had cut the stag's throat. There seemed nothing more to be done therefore, when the hounds, now thoroughly tired and footsore, had been satisfied, the jaded horses remounted, and the riders' different versions of their own doings exhausted for the present, than to jog slowly home, each in his own direction, with a happy chance of meeting more than one defeated sportsman, to whom he might repeat the oft-told tale, never weary of recapitulating the pace, distance, severity, triumphant conclusion, and whole chain of events that marked this memorable run.