Sound
there was none, only that faint stir--the far, far callings of men and
beasts and birds--that never quite dies of a country evening. High above
the wood some startled pigeons were still wheeling, no other life in
sight; but a gleam of sunlight stole down the side of the covert and
laid a burnish on the turned leaves till the whole wood seemed quivering
with magic. Out of that quivering wood a wounded rabbit had stolen and
was dying. It lay on its side on the slope of a tussock of grass,
its hind legs drawn under it, its forelegs raised like the hands of a
praying child. Motionless as death, all its remaining life was centred
in its black soft eyes. Uncomplaining, ungrudging, unknowing, with
that poor soft wandering eye, it was going back to Mother Earth. There
Foxleigh, too, some day must go, asking of Nature why she had murdered
him.

CHAPTER III

THE BLISSFUL HOUR

It was the hour between tea and dinner, when the spirit of the country
house was resting, conscious of its virtue, half asleep.

Having bathed and changed, George Pendyce took his betting-book into the
smoking-room. In a nook devoted to literature, protected from draught
and intrusion by a high leather screen, he sat down in an armchair and
fell into a doze.

With legs crossed, his chin resting on one hand, his comely figure
relaxed, he exhaled a fragrance of soap, as though in this perfect
peace his soul were giving off its natural odour. His spirit, on the
borderland of dreams, trembled with those faint stirrings of chivalry
and aspiration, the outcome of physical well-being after a long day in
the open air, the outcome of security from all that is unpleasant and
fraught with danger. He was awakened by voices.

"George is not a bad shot!"

"Gave a shocking exhibition at the last stand; Mrs. Bellew was with him.
They were going over him like smoke; he couldn't touch a feather."

It was Winlow's voice. A silence, then Thomas Brandwhite's:

"A mistake, the ladies coming out. I never will have them myself. What
do you say, Sir James?"

"Bad principle--very bad!"

A laugh--Thomas Brandwhite's laugh, the laugh of a man never quite sure
of himself.

"That fellow Bellew is a cracked chap. They call him the 'desperate
character' about here. Drinks like a fish, and rides like the devil. She
used to go pretty hard, too. I've noticed there's always a couple like
that in a hunting country. Did you ever see him? Thin, high-shouldered,
white