Page:Littell's Living Age - Volume 128.djvu/735

Rh "I'll soon settle you, my friend!" cries the happy hunter, taking out his knife.

"Oh, Arthur, don't!"

"What? you needn't look. It's all right. Put the poor animal out of its pain."

"Oh, do let it alone! let it die in peace." A sceptical laugh as he steps forward; she puts her hands before her eyes, and rushes into the wood.

"Where is your sister?"

It is Blount who has come up, joyously excited. "Mine is a buck, and the sweetest little head you ever saw! If Sir Charles will give it me, I mean to have it stuffed."

"A buck, is it? I heard you. I thought you were going to have all the luck. When it wasn't a right and left, I thought they must have moved off, and that it was that little fool Charlie who had done it! But the crittur knew better," says he, in high good-humour.

But where is your sister?"

"She has made off, I do believe. She would not stay to see the coup de grâce. Well, if the governor does his part, we shall have done a pretty good morning's work. Were the beaters near you?"

"Only once — that fat footman of yours holding out nobly: and oh! you should hear him call; the slow, pomposity with which he gives it forth, and his strut, strut, strut along — but no notion of giving in. He can't be a bad fellow."

"George? Oh, by no means, but I should have thought too much of a swell for this work. Now for luncheon — it is at the keeper's; and we have earned it, Harry, and no mistake."

"But where is your sister?"

"Oh, she will turn up; she's all right." (Bother these girls! what a nuisance they are!) "Come along."

"She can't go walking about the woods, you know, with all these guns about, and in that brown dress, too. We must find her."

"You look, then. I must go on and see that all is ready. Just wait a minute here, and she is sure to make her appearance."

"Can I miss the way?"

"Oh dear no. Besides, she knows it; but you had better come with me. Stop, I'll call. Bee! holloa!"

"I am here," comes a low voice from the fern, not very far off.

"And what did you give us such a fright for, then? Here were we just going off to hunt for you; at least Harry was. Come out here, you goose! we are going in to luncheon."

"Is — is the creature dead, Arthur?"

"Dead? Ages ago. Come out, I say."

She has been crouching on the wet ground behind a mossy rock, and comes forward with slow steps and a curiously white face.

"Well," exclaims her brother, "I did not think you had been such a silly! You have been at a hunt often enough before."

"I never saw one killed, and I never will come out again!" cried poor Beatrix.

Harry Blount is looking at her, and suddenly he seizes her arm, and exclaims, "Take care, Miss Graeme!" But he is too late: the colour has all left Bee's face, and she has sunk down sick and faint on the pathway.

What is to be done?

Arthur whistles in his consternation, Blount lifts her in his arms, and the two regard each other with a gaze of mute and helpless appeal.

Arthur has brandy, but no water — it is whiskey, by the way, as he is obliged to confess; but do they dare to give her this? If she were to choke! Neither of them knows what might happen, and Arthur looks at the bottle, and shakes it, and thinks he would like a mouthful himself, but puts it back in his pocket again.

"I'll tell you what, Harry. I'll run for the keeper's wife. You hold her there, and I sha'n't be gone a minute!"

Off he scampers, thankful to be free; while poor Blount, awkward and wretched, is left with his hapless burden.

"She is very pretty," he thinks. "Poor girl! What a shame it was to bring her, and how happy and jolly she was about coming! It was the sight of the blood, I know, just when she was tired and famishing. Now, who is to take her home? Not I. I must have one try in the next pass. Oh, she is coming round, is she?"

Yes; she opens her eyes, draws a breath, and puts her hand to her forehead, from which Harry has removed the hat.

Suddenly he twirls her round with velocity, putting himself between her eyes and the sad sight that had unnerved her before, and with the motion the maiden begins to feel something strange in her position.

Her senses return, and she rises to her feet.

How thankful Blount is to hear footsteps coming! for Arthur has met Sir Charles, and the boys and keepers, all on their way to the cottage.