'I have read, Lady Puddicombe, that "nothing exalts a man so much in a woman's mind as his dying. Look at the affection of widows as compared with that of wives." Ah, you are sorrowful, no doubt; but sorrow takes a long while to kill anyone.'
She knew well what he meant. Her pale cheek crimsoned, and she turned without a word, deeming it both absurd and cruel that he should thus be retrospectively jealous.
The hunters rode merrily off, all in high spirits, save Sir Paget, who jerked away with his head and was disposed to sulk, for the visit to Hurdell Hall had wrought no change on Eveline; thus he did not, like his companions, enjoy the delightful sense of rest and peace in the cool morning ride to covert.
The country was silent; ploughmen and shepherds were, as yet, scarcely abroad; and the full-fed cattle lay couched on the damp grass that glistened with dew, and from amid which their breaths rose like silvery steam, and ere long the pack was in sight--Grasper, Pilot, Holdfast, Catch, and all the rest of them--
'With tails high mounted, ears hung low, and throats With a whole gamut filled, of heavenly notes'
--at least in the estimation of the huntsmen.
Ere long the pack was put into the covert, and stirrup leathers were tightened and readjusted in hot haste, but with the hunting, the whipping of unbroken hounds that took to running after sheep, the gallops over a few fields to get up an appetite for an early luncheon at the Squire of Furzydown's, the 'chopping' of cubs, our story has nothing to do, save in so far as one episode of the day is concerned.
Sir Paget in his heart wished 'the whole affair at Jericho,' or in a warmer latitude. To him it was no amusement to set out without time for shaving, to breakfast at an untimeous hour and before he could get up an appetite, and to ride through the morning mist, with icy feet and grasping reins sodden with dew, with the certainty of an attack of rheumatism, when he should have been cosily nestling in bed; and in addition to all these, having a terrible conflict ever and anon with the bay hunter. Sir Harry thought him 'a silly old fogie, who _would_ go cub-hunting to show the world how juvenile he was,' and he was now beginning to console himself with the prospect of a luxurious luncheon at Furzydown and the long, lazy afternoon he would enjoy there before riding leisurely back in the evening to dinner at Hurdell Hall, when Sir Harry would be sure to sing them the old Coplow hunt song--