'Bother it!' he said. He did not care about Foxy, and he thought Hazel's affection for her very foolish; but he understood very well that if anything happened to Foxy, he would be to blame in Hazel's eyes. Between him and Hazel was a series of precipitous places. He would have to go round to reach her. He spurred his horse, risking a fall from the rabbit-holes and the great ropes of honeysuckle that swung from tree to tree.
Hazel ran to and fro, frantically calling to Foxy.
Suddenly the sound, that had been querulous, interrogative and various, changed like an organ when a new stop is pulled out.
The pack had found.
But the scent, it seemed, was not very hot. Hope revived in Hazel.
'It'll be the old scent from yesterday,' she thought. 'Maybe Foxy'll come yet!'
Seeing Reddin going in so devil-may-care a manner, a little clergyman (a 'guinea-pig' on Sundays and the last hard-riding parson in the neighbourhood on weekdays) thought that Reddin must have seen the fox, and gave a great view-hallo. He rode a tall raw-boned animal, and looked like a monkey.
Hazel did not see either him or Reddin. With fainting heart she had become aware that the hounds were no longer on an old scent. They were not only intent on one life now, but they were close to it. And whoever it was that owned the life was playing with it, coming straight on in the teeth of the wind instead of doubling with it.
With an awful constriction of the heart, Hazel knew who it was. She knew also that it was her momentary forgetfulness that had brought about this horror. Terror seized her at the dogs' approach, but she would not desert Foxy.
Then, with the fearful inconsequence of a dream, Foxy trotted out of the wood and came to her. Trouble was in her eyes. She was disturbed. She looked to Hazel to remove the unpleasantness, much as Mrs. Marston used to look at Edward.