aven't been talking about him at all." Crocker caught the tone of
anger, and stared at his companion. "I'd rather not talk about him."

"My lord! I hope there has been nothing like a quarrel. For the
lady's sake, I hope there's no misunderstanding!"

"Mr. Crocker," he said very slowly, "it isn't customary--"

At that moment the fox broke, the hounds were away, and Mr.
Amblethwaite was seen rushing down the hill-side, as though
determined on breaking his neck. Lord Hampstead rushed after him at
a pace which, for a time, defied Mr. Crocker. He became thoroughly
ashamed of himself in even attempting to make the man understand
that he was sinning against good taste. He could not do so without
some implied mention of his sister, and to allude to his sister in
connection with such a man was a profanation. He could only escape
from the brute. Was this a punishment which he was doomed to bear for
being--as his stepmother was wont to say--untrue to his order?

In the mean time the hounds went at a great pace down the hill. Some
of the old stagers, who knew the country well, made a wide sweep
round to the left, whence by lanes and tracks, which were known to
them, they could make their way down to the road which leads along
Ulleswater to Patterdale. In doing this they might probably not see
the hounds again that day,--but such are the charms of hunting in a
hilly country. They rode miles around, and though they did again see
the hounds, they did not see the hunt. To have seen the hounds as
they start, and to see them again as they are clustering round the
huntsman after eating their fox, is a great deal to some men.

On this occasion it was Hampstead's lot--and Crocker's--to do much
more than that. Though they had started down a steep valley,--down
the side rather of a gully,--they were not making their way out
from among the hills into the low country. The fox soon went up
again,--not back, but over an intervening spur of a mountain towards
the lake. The riding seemed sometimes to Hampstead to be impossible.
But Mr. Amblethwaite did it, and he stuck to Mr. Amblethwaite. It
would have been all very well had not Crocker stuck to him. If the
old roan would only tumble among the stones what an escape there
would be! But the old roan was true to his character, and, to give
every one his due, the Post Office clerk rode as well as the lord.
There was nearly an hour and a-half of it before the hounds ran
into their fox just as he w