It was an altogether absurd situation. After having endured so much to arrive at Coneywood Mill, he seemed to be still as far from his objective as ever. Short of making an exhibition of himself by shouting out his story at the top of his voice, he did not see what he could do. To whom should one refer the news of a casualty occurring during a day’s hunting? The Master of Hounds? Probably that was the right answer. After all, this was his hunt and he was in a way responsible. Pettigrew looked about for a commanding figure in pink coat and velvet cap and was relieved not to see him. A deeply conventional man, he felt that he was at the moment in no fit state to accost so important a functionary as the Master. It would be like going into Court without a wig. Even by modern standards, both he and his mount must look appallingly dishevelled. People were staring at them already.
One man was staring, at all events. And not only staring, but speaking.
“Here, you!” he said. “What are you doing on that pony?”
“Is this your pony?” said Pettigrew. “Thank God!”
He was a tall, heavy man riding a dun cob and he listened to the story with an impassive face. Pettigrew noticed that while it was being told he was looking, not at him but at the pony. When it was finished he said, “And which of you let the pony down-you or him?”
Pettigrew murmured something to the effect that he wasn’t sure.
“Dammit!” said the stranger. “Have you looked at his knees?”
Pettigrew had not looked at the pony’s knees. He made up his mind there and then that he would avoid doing so if possible.
“Well,” the man went on, briskly, “what have you done about this? Have you told Mr. Olding?”
“No,” said Pettigrew, rather sulkily. “I have not. And who is Mr. Olding, anyway?”
“Who is he? Good God, don’t you know anything? The Hunt Secretary, of course. I reckon this is his job if it’s anyone’s.”
Why didn’t I think of that? Pettigrew asked himself. Of course there is a secretary, and of course this is his job. Everything is. Blessed be the name of secretary. Amen.
“Mr. Olding! Mr. Olding, sir! Can you come here a minute?”
Mr. Olding could and did. He was a wiry, middle-aged man with keen eyes and that expression of resigned tolerance for human folly, common to senior police officers and hunt secretaries.
“Well, Tom, what is it this time?” he asked.
“Mr. Olding, sir, it’s Mr. Percy. He’s been thrown on Bolter’s Tussock, and killed. This gentleman found him there, dead as mutton, and the pony with him. So he gets on the pony and rides down here to tell us.”
Pettigrew was so impressed that even in his then condition he should be described as a gentleman, that he scarcely noticed the inaccuracy of this account of his adventures.
“Very good of him,” said Mr. Olding. He turned to Pettigrew. “I suppose you know that pony’s got a shoe loose behind? I noticed it when you came through the gate just now.”
“I-er-” said Pettigrew.
“I don’t blame you. You must have had rather a rough ride coming down here.”
“I allus told Mr. Percy he couldn’t hold the pony,” said Tom. “But he would have ’m.”
“I suppose that’s why you let him have the animal with a plain snaffle-just to make sure you’d be proved right. It’s simply asking him to bolt.”
“But he’s not a bolter, Mr. Olding-you know that. It’s simply that when he hears hounds-”
“All right, Tom. We won’t waste time arguing. We’d better get back to poor Percy. Not that there’ll be much we can do for him now.” He led the way out of the field, talking over his shoulder as he went. “I shall have to break the news to his sister, I suppose. Do you know if she’s got on the telephone yet, Tom? I must remember to ask her if she’ll let me have that spaniel of Percy’s. I was only talking to him about it the other day. He was due to shoot with me next week, and I said to him…”
Mr. Olding hit off a route back to Bolter’s Tussock that was little longer and a great deal easier than the way by which Pettigrew had come down. None the less, Pettigrew found it a very exhausting ride. He was by now extremely stiff. His legs, in their unsuitable thin flannel trousers, felt lacerated. He had arrived at Coneywood Mill bathed in sweat and the fresh breeze which sprang up as they emerged from the wood sent a chill right through him. The pony went quietly enough, and for this he was grateful. He felt that in his then condition he was liable to tumble off its back on the slightest pretext.
“Well,” said Mr. Olding, drawing rein on the heathery top of the Tussock. “Here we are. Where does he lie?”
Pettigrew had never prided himself on possessing a bump of direction, and he had wondered in the course of the ride whether he would be able to find the spot again without long search. But he need not have worried. The position was quite unmistakable. The road on one side and a conspicuous outcrop of rock on the other fixed it beyond doubt. He led the others to it without hesitation.
There was nothing there.
After what seemed a long time, Pettigrew heard Mr. Olding say, “It looks as if you’d made a mistake.”
Pettigrew shook his head miserably.
“No,” he said. “I’m not mistaken. This was the place all right.”
“You’re quite sure? You know what it is with a fallen bird. Unless you’ve marked it properly, you may be yards out when you go to pick it up.”
Pettigrew did not know what it was with a fallen bird, but he remained positive.
“Well, in that case…” Mr. Olding turned to look at the pony’s owner, and Pettigrew could see in his face a look of scepticism. “It’s a rum business. What do you think, Tom?”
“Perhaps Mr. Percy wasn’t all that dead, sir?” Tom suggested. “He’d only have a couple of yards to walk to the road, and he would have got a lift home from there.”
“H’m. A runner, and not a dead bird? It’s an idea.”
“No,” said Pettigrew. “When I saw him, he wasn’t in a condition to walk a couple of yards, or any distance. And I’m pretty sure he never will be.”
“You seem bloody positive about everything, sir,” said Mr. Olding. “Upon my word, I’m beginning to wonder-”
“Mr. Olding, sir! Look behind you!” cried Tom.
They looked round. Advancing towards them from the direction of Tucker’s Barrows was a small man in riding kit. His bowler hat had a dent in the crown, his face was flushed crimson with heat or emotion, or both and he walked as a man will walk who has trudged some distance on a hot day, through thick heather, in top boots; but in all other respects he seemed to be perfectly hale, if not hearty.
“Good God! Percy!” exclaimed Mr. Olding.
CHAPTER VI. At Fault
Are you all right, Percy?” asked Mr. Olding anxiously.
Percy said nothing for a moment. He stood there, in the centre of the little group of mounted men, his red face twitching, his breath coming and going.
“Am I all right?” he burst out finally. “My godfathers! What the hell do you expect me to be? All right! I like that!”
He broke into what was evidently intended to be derisive laughter, but which turned into a fit of coughing.