Several hounds were billeted in small cottages in the neighbourhood, and she meant to try to see them all. But the conciliation of the Caseys being necessary before any others could be looked at, she shook hands and tramped away.
Andrew, trotting beside her, asked wistfully if she was sot on the dogs.
"Beauty do be sleepin' with me," he said shyly. "I lets him in anonst an' me Mama aslheep."
Gheena, seeing something glimmer behind bright eyelashes, promised Andy that if they hunted, she would lend him Ratty, her Welsh pony, for every meet. This was a small mouse-coloured animal, which attacked large banks as if they were a ladder, but always got to the other side without mishap, and which could go all day. Walls were not often seen, and timber he either went over or under, in both cases generally dislodging his rider. He had a mouth of iron and the self-will of Lucifer, coupled with complete determination to get after hounds, but he was absolutely safe and neither kicked nor bucked.
"Every nice day if we hunt, then, Andy," said Gheena. "And—and you wouldn't like to see all the foxes dead and none to go after when the poor huntsmen come back from the war."
The light of desire in Andy's eyes showed that he would now put up with even the loss of Beauty as a bedfellow. He knew Ratty well.
A doubt concerning a "ridin' throuser" being solved by the promise of a pair of his very own, Andy's eyes sparkled wildly, and to show his gratitude he offered guidance by the short cut, explaining that he had not even an eye sthuck to his feet when he crossed in it yestherday, the two dogs an' Dandy bein' close on a hare; so it might be right if crossed careful.
Gheena chose the road. She had often jogged up it out hunting; now it seemed to wind interminably, and the surface to grate away under each step she took.
High banks, with blackberry vines and honeysuckle sprawling over them, kept away the wind. Gheena toiled up a steep glen and thought out what she would say to Darby. In the glen the clinging friendship of the blackberry and honeysuckle gave way to bare red banks spangled with slabs of drab slate, which caught and gave back the heat of the sun, little oozing trickles of moisture being quite insufficient to cool them.
The glen ended at cross roads. Gheena stood still there. She was extremely hot, her feet ached in the buckled shoes, and she eyed the winding brown ribbon of road turning towards the left towards Marty Casey's house with bitter dislike.