And he hobbled off, muttering to himself as he went: “The North Plantation! The chap must be a fool!... They poor dogs, they was glad to see I!—jist about; but bain’t he a sammy! There he do go and feed up the shooting dogs so as they be for all the world like pigs, and Jet, what we used to keep same as a little queen, he do seem to take no more notice of nor if she was a cat! Poor Jet! How she did cry to get to I! Well, well! I may be able to put things straight a bit.”
Proceeding at his slow pace, the pilgrimage to the North Plantation was a matter of considerable time, and it was noon before he halted at length beside the enclosure where hundreds of tiny pheasant chicks ran in and out of their several coops, with a venturesomeness much deplored by their distracted hen foster-mothers.
A tall, middle-aged man was walking about amid the pens, with a proudly proprietary air which announced him to be the head-keeper.
Guppy wiped the sweat of weakness and fatigue from his brow and uttered a quavering “Hullo!” Mr. Sanders turned and walked majestically towards him.
“What do you want,” he inquired briefly.
“I be jist come up-along to have a look round,” announced John. “I’m Mr. Guppy, what was here afore you. You be in my shoes now, I mid say, but I don’t bear ’ee no grudge for ’t—no, I don’t bear ’ee no grudge,” he repeated handsomely.
“Right,” said Sanders, who was a good-humoured fellow enough, if a little puffed up by the dignity of his position. “Glad to see you, Mr. Guppy. We’ve got a nice lot here, haven’t we?”
“’E-es,” agreed Guppy, with a note of reserve in his voice; “’e-es, a tidyish lot; but you’ll not bring up the half o’ them.”
“Won’t I, indeed?” retorted Sanders, somewhat warmly. “What makes you say that?”
“I could ha’ telled ’ee as this here weren’t a fit place for young pheasants,” returned the ex-keeper, not without a certain triumph. “If you’d ha’ come to I, I could ha’ telled ye. I’ve a-been thirty-nine year and nine month i’ this place, and I’ve never put the young pheasants here once—never once. What do you say to that?”