The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, April 26, 1903, Page 7

| - « papting S now, that's my fellow,” sald when I y, pointing to a fine-looking colt; trom ““the chestnut with the white diamond on o his forehead. He'll run Into three figures r = before he's done; but we'll not tell that g to_the old lady 3 > famous Aussolas bogs were as full . of snipe as usual, and a good deal fuller f £ of water than any- bogs 1 had ever shot before. I was on my day, and Flurry was . not; and as he is ordinarily an infinitely : better snipe shot thaa I, I felt at peace b with tke world and all men as we waiked = bac wat throu at 3 o'ciock T f ot d a big w ; i moon was making the eastern tower fst. Aussolas look like a thing in a fairy taie 3 or a p.ay when we arrived at the hail s 1 door. An individual, whom I recognized o L4 ead Fliorence as tne Robir n ( ““”-.v ac an, admit- r g str ted us to a hall the like-of which one King & ea Y does not often see. The walls were pan- ] things save his duty. exterded to me kad the grubby tan that eled with dark oak up to the gallery that 3 ohe ] have that I'd trust bespoke the professional gardener, and ran around three sides of it, the balust ' #aid his master, flick- was decorated with a magnificent diamond €rs on the wide Staircase were heavily - ngly with the whip; ring. On her head was a massive purple carved, and blackened portraits of of people atraid to come velvet bonnet Flurry's ancestors on the spindle side - e ° and when my grandmother *I am very glad to meet you, Major stared sourly down on their descendant I s Iriving she has a boy on the boX Yeates.” sne said, With an old-fashioned as he tramped upstalrs with the bog mold Eugle y With a basket full of stones to Dex at precision of utterance. “Your grandfather On his hobnailed boots. c b - t m. Talk of the dickens, here ghe is her- was a dancing partner of mine in old days We had just changed inte dry clothes - 3 o melf . at the castle when he was a handsome when Robinson Crusoe shoved his red ™ Do aian 2 . A short, upright old woman was ap- young alde-de-camp there, and 1 was—you beard round the corner of the door with I wish you'd take gates of Aussolas shrieked on Proaching preceded by a white, wolly dog may judge for yourself what I was. the information that the mistress sald we bt ed as they admitted us, and With sore eyes and a bark like a tin She ended with a startling little hoot of were to stay for dinner. My heart sank. of pe clang behind us in the faces trumpet: we both gnt out of the trap and laughter, and 1 was aware that she quite It was then barely 5:30. I sald something a couple of y g @edvanced to meet the lady of the manor. realized the world's opinion of her, and about having no evening clothes and hav- eir break for ths I may summarize her attire by saying was indifferent to it. Ing to get home early. iter world, turned that she looked as if she had robbed a _Our wayvs to the bogs took up across “Sure, the dinner'il be in another half ge g y on efther side of scar w; her face was small and incon- Mrs. Knox's home farm, and through a hour,” sald Robinson Crusoe, joining hos. This » cot ered on, gruously refined, the skinny hand that she large herd in which several young horses bly in the conversation; “and as for . 1 . ks since id me ’ es your stables / - = Lz . N as ot ke a baref: = out of ect her to te to s n a noiseless IS he .- " . . = es e has zen of them, any ¥ colts some of y n as well be donkeys . ey are me or ar ee years she se as them walking . f suger, like a lot Flurry with disgu: plan? Do you wan X i for one of the lap- lied Flurry, with my birthday's uld work a Trinket's she has out ccasior dmother's birthday » e swered Flur- f e had a w Le r . e er 10ld me that h (o offer s ooting on ebrate . gs, and he pro- t r the following € st peopie found e s Aussolas snipe ey & c Zight foliow morning i ry, myself and a groom packed r anteaus, g s setters. 1 twelve miles at least, ne. We passed through ire country, fraug emories of runs, w for me, fence by fence, in the biggest dog-fox > ground, with accurately on the 7 . 2 ween him and the € f whick ending bogs that imper- — ce elted Jakes, and finally \3}\“\ SN \!\'» a valley, where the = o = clustered dirkly S P )Y i Y ke, all but hid . d pointed gables of Aus- ch of demesne evening clothes—God bless ve!™ The door closed behind him. “Never mind,” sald Flurry, “I dare say you'll be glad enough to eat another din- ner by the time you home.” laughed. ‘““Poor Slipper! #equently, and only laughed again whea I asked for an explanation. Old Mrs, Knox recelved us in the libra- ry, where she was seated by a roaring turf fire, which ‘lighted the room a good deal more effectively than the pair of can- dies that stood beside her in tall silver candlesticks. Ceaseless and Implacable growles from under her chair indicated the presence of the woolly dog. She talked with confounding culture of the books that rose all round her to the celling: her cvening dress was accomplished by means of an additional white shawl, rather dirtier than its congeners; as I took her ir to dinner she quoted Virgil to me, and in the same breath screeched an objurga- tion at a being whose matted head rose suddenly In view behind an anclent Chi- nese screen, as I have seen the head of & Zulu woman peer over a bush; Dinner was as incongruous as every- thing else. Detestable soup in a splendid old siiver tureen that was nearly as dark in hue as Roblnson Crusoe's thumb; a perfect salmon, perfectly cooked, on a chipped kitchen dish; such cut glass as is nut egsy to find nowada; sherry that, as Flurry ubsequently remarked, would burn the shell off an egg: and a bottle of port draped in iImmemorial cobwebs, wan with age and probably pr vicissitudes of the meal Mrs. conversation flowed on undismayed, rected sometimes at me—she had insta me in the position of friend of her y and talked to me if T were my own grandfather, sometimes at Crusoe, with whom she had several heated arguments, end sometimes she would make a state- ment of remarkable frankness on the sub- ject of her horse-farming affairs to Flur- ry, who, very much on his best behavior, agreed with all she said and risked no original remark. As I listened them both, T remembered with infinite amuse- ment how he had told me once that “a pet name she had for him was ‘Tony Lumpkin,’ and no one but herself knew what she meant by it."" It seemed strange that she made no allusion to Trinket's colt or to Flurry's birthday, but, mindtul of my instructions, I held my peace. As, at about $:30 o'clock, we drove away ~ele. Throughout Knox's di- as “ArILL YOU KINDLY TWwLL ME,” SAID ; MRS KMOX SLowTy, TATI L M BEDLA " 7 in the moonlight, Flurry congrataulated me solemnly on my success with his grandmother. He was good enough to tell me that she would marry me to-mer- row if I asked her, and he wished I would, even if it was only to see what a nice grandson he’d be for me. A sympe- thetic giggle behind me told me that Michael, on the back seat, had heard and relished the jest @ had left the gates of Aussolas about half a mile behind, when, at the corner of & by-road, Flurry led up. A short. #quat figure arose m black shadow of a furze bush and came ocut into the moonlight, swinging arms like a cab- man and cursing audibly “Oh, murdher, oh murdher, Misther Flurry! What kept ye at all? 'Twould per- ish the crows to be waiting here the way I am these two hours—'" “Ah, shut your mouth, Slipper!” sald Flurry, who, to my surprise, had turned bac kthe rug and was taking off his driv- ing coat, “I in't help it.. Come om, Yeates, we've got to get out here.’ “What for?" I asked, In not unnatural bewilderment. “It's all right. I'll tell you as we go along,” replied my companion, who was already turning w Slipper up the by-road. “Take the trap Michael, and wait at the River's Cr He waitel for with him, and then put his Major, this dmother’s given . but if 1 waited to mé I'd never So I just thought me to come up hand on my a is the way it s me that colt righ for her to send see a hair see, that as we were over here we might as well take him back wi and maybe you'll kive us a help with him; he’ll not be altogether too handy for g first go off.” 1 was stagge An infant in arms could scarc fishiness of t n, and I begged Mr. Knox no nself to this trou= b ad no doubt I could find a h friend else- where. Mr. K od me that it was ne trou t all e coptrary, and that since his other had given no reason why he when he wanted n't want him he'd him himself, and, n't the chap to go back I was welcome to drive him the colt he should not take him; also that iIf 1 wa back to Shreelane with Michael this min- ute if I Itked Of course, I ylelded in the end. I told lose my job over the busi- I could then marry hi the discussion was ecess! of fol- -barred Flurry ness, ar I sho d he sa fa stone mbhing leceptive moon- s at length in a iina build e way to me in a 1e better. It's just slip in and an open we ccax him lipper waist a haiter and my col ors into the sha me to medita mag- istrate and would be asked s ! mem- ber when Sliy ven away the ad- venture In his a In less t + minute thres shadows emerged e d, where two had & he colt. . t as a calf when ke wi “it was wel pockets from poag o . He and er had a rope from each side s 1: they took him quickly across a field toward a gate. The colt stepped daintily between m over the moon-lit grass orted occasional- but apy o The trouble bega troubie ofte of a short aret judgment of SIi n following a route w as well as his own was that in the consequence minutes I found myself standing on top of a bank hanging on to a rope, on the other end of which the colt dangled and danced, while Flurry, with the other rope, lay prome In the itch and Slipper administered to the be- wildered colt's I arters such chas- tisement as be ventured on. 1 have no space to narrate in detall the ould atroclous difficulties and disasters of the short cut. How the colt set to work to buck, and went across a fleld, drag- ging the fa lipper, literally ventre- a-terre, after him, while I pleked myself in Ignominy out of briar patch, and Flurry cursed himself black In the face. How we were attacked by ferocious cur dogs, and I lost my eyeglass: and how, as we neared the River's Cross, Flurry espled the police patrol on the road, and we all hid behind a rick of turf, while I realized in fullness what an exceptional ass I was to have been beguiled into an enterprise t nvolved hiding with Slip- per from the Royal Irish Constabulary. Let it suffice to nat Trinket's infer- nal offspring finally handed over on the high read to Michael and Siipper, and Flurry @rove me home In a state of men- tal and physical overthrow, I saw nothing of my friend Mr. Knox for the next couple of days, by the end of which time I had worked uo a high polish on my misgivings, and had deter- him that under no circum- ces would I have anything to say to s grand ther's birthday present Tt was like my usual luck that, instead of writing a note to this effect, I thought it good for my liver to walk across the s to Tory Cottage Flurry so in p It was a bright, blustry morning, after a muggy day. The feeling.of spring was in the alr, the daffodils were already in bud and c showed purple in the grass on either side of the avenue. It was only a couple of miles to Tory Cot- tage by tile way across the hills. 1 walked fast, and it was barely 12 o'clock when I saw its pink walls and clumps of ever- greens below me. As I looked down at it the chiming of Flurry's hounds in the kennels came to me on the wind. I stood still to listen, and could almost have sworn that I was hearing again the clash of Magdalen bells hard at work on May morning. The path that I was following led down- ward through a large plantation to Flur- ry's back gate. Hot wartts from some hidtous caldron at the other side of a wall apprised me of the vicinity of the kenneis and their cuisine, and the fir trées round were hung with grewsome and unknown joints. I thanked Heaven that I was not a master hounds, and passed on as qQuickly as might be to the hall door. I rang two or three times without re- sponse; then the door opened a couple of and tell ocuse Inches and was instanutly slammed in my face. 1" heard the hurried paddling of bare feet on olleloth and a voice, “Hurry Bridgte, hurry; there's quality at thw door! Bridgle, holding a dirty cap on with one hand, presently arrived and informed me that she belleved Mr. Knox was out about the place. She seemed perturbed, and she cast scared glances down the drive while speaking to me I knew enough of Flurry's habits to shape a tolerably direct course for his whereabouts. He was, as I had expected, in the training paddock, a field behind the stable yard, in which he had put up prac- tice jumps for his horse. It was a good sized fleld, with clumps of furze in it, and Flurry was standing near one of with his hands in his pockets, singu unoccupied. I suppoSed that he was pros pecting for a place to put up another jump. He did not see me coming and turned with a start as I spoke to him. There was a queer expression of mingled guilt and what I can only cribe as devilment in his gr eyes as he greeted me. In my dealings Flurry Knog I habit of sitting when I see that have since formed th tight, in a general w expression. Continued on Page Thirteen.