heard a sound. He was an old man--a man who had
been on the estate all his life--and had come in late in the evening
after a long round. He sat by the fire of split logs and enjoyed the
warmth after the bitter cold and frost; and, as he himself confessed,
took an extra glass in consideration of the severity of the weather.

His wife was old and deaf. Neither of them heard the guns nor the dogs.
Those in the kennels close to the cottage, and very likely one or more
indoors, must have barked at the noise of the shooting. But if any dim
sense of the uproar did reach the keeper's ear he put it down to the
moon, at which dogs will bay. As for his assistants, they had quietly
gone home, so soon as they felt sure that the keeper was housed for the
night. Long immunity from attack had bred over-confidence; the staff
also was too small for the extent of the place, and this had doubtless
become known. No one sleeps so soundly as an agricultural labourer; and
as the nearest hamlet was at some distance it is not surprising that
they did not wake.

In the early morning a fogger going to fodder his cattle came across a
pheasant lying dead on the path, the snow stained with its blood. He
picked it up, and put it under his smock-frock, and carried it to the
pen, where he hid it under some litter, intending to take it home. But
afterwards, as he crossed the fields towards the farm, he passed near
the wood and observed the tracks of many feet and a gap in the fence. He
looked through the gap and saw that the track went into the preserves.
On second thoughts he went back for the pheasant and took it to his
master.

The farmer, who was sitting down to table, quietly ate his breakfast,
and then strolled over to the keeper's cottage with the bird. This was
the first intimation: the keeper could hardly believe it, till he
himself went down and followed the trail of foot-marks. There was not
the least difficulty in tracing the course of the poachers through the
wood; the feathers were lying about; the scorched paper (for they used
muzzle-loaders), broken boughs, and shot-marks were all too plain. But
by this time the gang were well away, and none were captured or
identified.

The extreme severity of the frost naturally caused people to stay
indoors, so that no one noticed the cart going through the village; nor
could the track of its wheels be discerned from others on the snow of
the highway beaten down firm. Even had the poachers been di