‘Now,’ he said, ‘you talk very big about words of honour. Can you speak the truth?’
Dickie said, ‘If you think we shot it, you’re wrong. We know better than that.’
The white-whiskered one turned suddenly to H. O. and pulled him out of the hedge.
‘And what does that mean?’ he said, and he was pink with fury to the ends of his large ears, as he pointed to the card on H. O.‘s breast, which said, ‘Moat House Fox-Hunters’.
Then Oswald said, ‘We WERE playing at fox-hunting, but we couldn’t find anything but a rabbit that hid, so my brother was being the fox; and then we found the fox shot dead, and I don’t know who did it; and we were sorry for it and we buried it—and that’s all.’
‘Not quite,’ said the riding-breeches gentleman, with what I think you call a bitter smile, ‘not quite. This is my land and I’ll have you up for trespass and damage. Come along now, no nonsense! I’m a magistrate and I’m Master of the Hounds. A vixen, too! What did you shoot her with? You’re too young to have a gun. Sneaked your Father’s revolver, I suppose?’
Oswald thought it was better to be goldenly silent. But it was vain. The Master of the Hounds made him empty his pockets, and there was the pistol and the cartridges.
The magistrate laughed a harsh laugh of successful disagreeableness.
‘All right,’ said he, ‘where’s your licence? You come with me. A week or two in prison.’
I don’t believe now he could have done it, but we all thought then he could and would, what’s more.