"Had you recovered all the jewels for the Grand Duchess?" he asked
Darragh.
"Every one, Jack. … Quintana has done me a terrible injury. I shan't let it go. I mean to hunt that man to the end."
Stormont, terribly perplexed, nodded.
A few minutes later, as they came out among the willows and alders on the northeast side of Star Pond, Stormont touched his comrade's arm.
"Look at that enormous dog-otter out there in the lake!"
"Grab those dogs! They'll strangle each other," cried Darragh quickly. "That's it — unleash them, Jack, and let them go!" — he was struggling with the other two couples while speaking.
And now the hounds, unleashed, lifted frantic voices. The very sky seemed full of the discordant tumult; wood and shore reverberated with the volume of convulsive and dissonant baying.
"Damn it," said Darragh, disgusted, "— that's what they've been trailing all the while across-woods, — that devilish dog-otter yonder. … And I had hoped they were on Quintana's trail——"
A mass rush and scurry of crazed dogs nearly swept him off his feet, and both men caught a glimpse of a large bitch-otter taking to the lake from a ledge of rock just beyond.
Now the sky vibrated with the deafening outcry of the dogs, some taking to water, others racing madly along the shore.