“I have known them to start breeding as early as March,” Martin said. “It is not usual, I own, but it is very possible.” He turned his head to address his brother. “I have said I’ll ride to Roxmere this morning, to look at some likely young ‘uns, but I mean to take a gun out this afternoon, and try for them.”
“It is sad that the kestrel, or as I like to call it, the windhover, should be so destructive,” said Mr. Clowne. “To see them hovering above, as though suspended, is a pretty sight.”
“I question whether they are so destructive as people suppose,” remarked Theo.
“Good God, if we were to have a pair of them breeding in the West Wood we should not have a pheasant or a partridge chick left!” Martin exclaimed.
“I fancy you would find, if you could observe them closely, that they subsist mostly on field-mice. Had you said sparrow-hawks,now — !”
In refuting this heresy, and in recalling to Theo’s memory various incidents which seemed to support his own theory, Martin for a little while forgot his care, and talked with an animation which would not have led anyone to suppose that he was suffering all the more severe pangs of unrequited love. He looked as though he had not slept well, but he ate a large breakfast, and only towards the end of it remembered that his affections had been blighted, and that his archenemy sat opposite to him, unconcernedly consuming cold beef. The cloud descended again on to his brow, and he relapsed into silence; but when he rose from the table, and the Earl called after him: “Keep your eyes open for anything that might suit me at Roxmere!” he paused in the doorway, and replied quite cordially: “If you wish it, but I don’t think Helston has much to show me but young ‘uns.”
“I don’t mind that. A good three-year-old, Martin, not too short in the back, and well ribbed-up! But you know the style of thing!”
Martin nodded. “I’ll see,” he said.
He did not return to Stanyon until noon, and by that time the Viscount had driven himself over to Whissenhurst. Martin walked into one of the saloons just as his mother, Miss Morville, and Gervase were sitting down to partake of cold chickens and fruit. He brought with him two letters, which had been fetched up from the receiving-office. “One for you, Drusilla, and one for you, St. Erth. From Louisa,” he added. “Lay you a pony she wants you to invite them all to Stanyon in June!”
“From Louisa?” said the Dowager. “Why should Louisa be writing to St. Erth? Depend upon it, you are mistaken! It cannot be from her!”