They rode soberly side by side, over the noisy cobbles, down to the low white bridge thronged with pedestrians, threading their way amidst the stream that was turning in at the gates farther on to the right.
"We'll keep on, shall we?" said Barnaby. "Hounds will be moving directly, and there'll be a fearful crowd getting out of the Park."
So they held on between the lines of townsfolk and, turning upward, fell in with a cluster of horsemen on the watch, loitering on the hill.
"Awful bore, meeting in the town like this," said one of these peevishly. His horse was eyeing a perambulator strangely, and there was no space for antics. "Why do the Quorn do it?"
"Oh, it pleases the multitude."
There was a roar down below, and a scuffling noise as of hundreds running. Above the bobbing heads passed a glimpse of scarlet, as a whip issued from the green gates, clearing a way for hounds that were hidden from view in the middle of the throng. Barnaby turned his horse round.
"Come on," he said. "We'll wait for them out of the town. I suppose it's the customary pilgrimage? Gartree Hill."
Behind them, louder and louder, drowning the tumult, came the quickening tramp of horses. Their own animals grew excited.
"Sit him tight!" said Barnaby. Her horse had nearly bucked into the last lamp-post at the top of the hill. He would not wait peaceably at the corner, so she took him a few yards farther on, straight over the brow, where the way was not street, but road, looking down upon open country.
"Hullo!" said Barnaby.