“You will be back, Dr. Hutton, when my father returns from his ride? It is very foolish of me, but I cannot bear this suspense”.
“Trust me. I will see to it. But he will not be back, they tell me, till nearly four oʼclock”.
“Oh, what a time to wait! Donʼt send for me if you can help it. But, if he wants me, I will come”.
“Good–bye, my lad. Keep your pecker up. There are hundreds of men in the world with harder lines than yours”.
“I should rather think so. I only wish there were not”.
Cradock attempted a lively smile, and executed a pleasant one, as Rufus Hutton shook his hand, and set off upon his business. And his business was to ride at once as far as the “Jolly Foresters”, that lonely inn on the Beaulieu–road, at the eastern end of the parish, whereat John Rosedew baited Coræbus at the turn of the pastoral tour. The little doctor knew well enough, though he seldom passed that way, how the smart Miss Penny of former days, Mrs. OʼGaghanʼs assistant, was now the important Mrs. George Cripps, hostess of the “Jolly Foresters”, where the four roads met.
Meanwhile, the scaffolds went on merrily under Mr. Garnetʼs care, and so did the awnings, marquees, &c., and the terraces for the ladies. The lamps in the old oak being fixed, the boughs were manned, like a frigateʼs yards, with dexterous fellows hoisting flags, devices, and transparencies, all prepared to express in fire the mighty name of Cradock. All the men must finish that night, lest any one lose his legitimate chance of being ancestrally drunk on the morrow. Cradock Nowell, wandering about, could not bear to go near them. Those two hours seemed longer to him than any year of his previous life. He went and told Caldo all about it; and that helped him on a little.
Caldo was a noble setter, pure of breed, and high of soul, and heavily feathered on legs and tail. His colour was such a lily white, that you grieved for him on a wet fallow; and the bright red spots he was endowed with were like the cheeks of Helen. Delicate carmine, enriched with scarlet, mapped his back with islands; and the pink of his cheeks, where the whiskers grew, made all the young ladies kiss him. His nostrils were black as a double–lined tunnel leading into a pencil–mine; and his gums were starred with violet, and his teeth as white as new mushrooms. In all the county of Hants there was no dog to compare with him; for he came of a glorious strain, made perfect at Kingston, in Berkshire. Lift but a finger, and down he went, in the height of his hottest excitement; wave the finger, and off he dashed, his great eyes looking back for repression. For style of ranging, all dogs were rats to him, anywhere in the New Forest; so freely he went, so buoyant, so careful, and yet all the while so hilarious. Only one fault he had, and I never knew dog without one; he was jealous to the backbone.
Cradock was dreadfully proud of him. Anything else he had in the world he would have given to Clayton, but he could not quite give Caldo; even though Clayton had begged, instead of backing his Wena against him. Wena was a very nice creature, anxious to please, and elegant; but of a different order entirely from the high–minded Caldo. Dogs differ as widely as we do. Who shall blame either of us?
Cradock now leaned over Caldo, with the hot tears in his eyes, and gently titillating the sensitive part of his ears, and looking straight into his heart, begged to inform him of the trouble they were both involved in. “Have they taken the shooting from us”? was Caldoʼs first inquiry; and his eyes felt rather sore in his head that he should have to ask the question. “No, my boy, they havenʼt. But we must not go shooting any more, until the whole matter is settled”. “I hate putting off things till to–morrow”, Caldo replied, impatiently; “the cock–pheasants come almost up to my kennel. What the deuce is to come of it”? “Caldo, please to be frigido. You shall come to my room by–and–by. I shall be able then to smoke a pipe, and we will talk about it together. You know that I have never cared about the title and all that stuff”.