Page:Tarka the Otter.djvu/163

Spady Gut heavy boy led by a sharp little quick-eyed tacker, came Rufus, who cared more for a nest of field-mice than for a joint or rib of rank otter. After Rufus on the tide-wall ran Dewdrop, whose long fawn-coloured hair was curly with wet. Her ears himg long and loose.

Often while the trophies were being taken by the huntsman those ears would flap between blue-stocking’d legs, and teeth would slyly nip through wool, as though it were brown fur of the worry. By the Wharfdale bitchfor Dewdrop was the only true otterhound in the packran Playboy and Actor, whose dingy-white shapes were so alike that only the huntsman could name them truly. Behind them came Render and Fencer, who always tore at roots of a holt with their teeth; Hemlock, with one eye blind, the dark pupil grey-veined with the scar of a black-thorn prick; Hurricane, the ancient Irish stag-hound with the filed canines; Barbrook and Bellman, Boisterous and Chorister, Coraline, Sailoress, Waterwitch, and Armlet, who always stood apart from the pack during holt-marking and bayed moodily like a lighthouse siren. Then came Sandboy, who fought other hounds at the worry, and Grinder and Darnelhounds who had chased the fox. They trotted on the tide-wall between the short, quick-stepping huntsman and the long-legged whip and kennel-boy, whose long loose striding had been formed in early years by crossing ploughlands on his way to school.

Twenty paces behind the pack walked the Master, with two members of the Hunt. He was saying that it had been a great day, only lacking