"There is one thing, sir." Barty returned an indirect reply. "That hunt or no, they'll get a bit to ate another mornin'. We only tore them off the back of Carty's mother's pig, an' they had three chickens gone from me own aunt while you'll be clappin' an eyelid."
Matilda Freyne asked Dearest George if he thought it would be wise to get up, and was then lifted to the saddle without making any effort to assist in the proceedings. Once there, she consulted Dearest George as to her straps and the adjustment of her reins, and was placidly happy on her quiet horse.
Gheena had forgotten all wars as she endeavoured to persuade her brown mare not to buck. It was so good to be out with any kind of hounds again.
George Freyne having taken his new hunting cap out of a hat-box and adjusted it with pride, shouted to Darby to wait for him, and grew irritable when Darby looked reproachfully at his watch.
"If you had a wife to get fixed up and the hang post late on account of the hang war! Hunting horn only just here in a box not even opened. Here you, Phil, are there straps for it and for the case?"
"They are, sir," said Phil briefly.
Dearest George tore feverishly at the nailed box, injured one of his fingers, and having sucked it noisily, mounted his horse, ordering Phil to open the hang thing and fix it on.
By this time the majority of the small field had collected by the Freynes' motor, feeling that George Freyne was to blame for keeping them waiting and looking at him reproachfully. Mr. O'Gorman remarked "Twenty past" just as the lid of the box cracked open.
"And you'd like it to be forty past if you were late yourself, O'Gorman," snapped Dearest George bitterly. "I'll move on without you often enough. How is a joint master to go out with nothing to play on, blow at—er—sound for his hounds, I should like to know?"
Here Darby wanted patiently to know if Phil was digging trenches or only opening a box.