Part 10

"Put up seventeen hares and ten covey of partridges visiting outposts to-day--take my advice and scrap that moustache while you're about it, it must be a heavy drain on your system--and twenty hares and four covey riding home. Do you find lathering the ears improves their growth, or what?"

"The country is crawling with game," said I, ignoring his personalities, "and here we are hanging body and soul together on bully and dog biscuit."

"Exactly," said Albert Edward, "and in the meanwhile the festive _lapin_ breeds and breeds. Has it ever occurred to you that, if something isn't done soon, we'll have Australia's sad story over again here in Picardy? Give the rabbits a chance and in no time they'll have eaten off all the crops in France. Why, on the Burra I've seen----"

"One moment," said I; "if I listen to your South Australian rabbit story again you've got to listen to my South African locust yarn; it's only fair."

"Oh, shut up," Albert Edward growled; "can't you understand this question is deadly serious?"

"Best put the Tanks on to 'em then," I suggested; "they'd enjoy themselves, and the Waterloo Cup wouldn't be in it--Captain Monkey-Wrench's brindled whippet, 'Sardine Tin,' 6 to 4; Major Spanner's 'Pig Iron,' 7 to 2; even money the field."

"Your humour is a trifle strained," said Albert Edward; "if you're not careful you'll crack a joke at the expense of a tendon one of these days."

"Look here," said I, wiping the blood off my safety-razor, "you're evidently struggling to give expression to some heavy brain wave; out with it."

"What about a pack of harriers?" said Albert Edward. "There must be swarms of sportive tykes about, faithful Fidos that have stuck to the dear old homestead through thick and thin, also refugee animals that follow the sweet-scented infantry cookers. I've got my old hunting-horn; you've got your old crop; between the two we ought to be able to mobilize 'em a bit and put the wind up these darn hares. I'm going to try anyway. I may say I look on it as a duty."

"Looked on in that light it's a sacred duty," said I; "and--er--incidentally we might reap a haunch of hare out of it now and again, mightn't we?"

"Incidentally, yes," said Albert Edward, "and a trifle of sport into the bargain--incidentally."

So we set about collecting a pack there and then by offering our servants five francs per likely dog and no questions asked.

No questions were asked, but I have a strong suspicion that our gentlemen were up all night and that there were dark deeds done in the dead of it, for the very next evening my groom and countryman presented us with a bill for forty-five francs.

The dogs, he informed us, were kennelled "in a little shmall place the like of an ice-house" at the northern extremity of the château grounds, and that "anyway a blind man himself couldn't miss them wid the screechin' an' hollerin' they are afther raisin' be dint of the confinement."

I had an appointment with the Q. Staff (to explain why I had indented for sixty-four horse rations while only possessing thirty-two horses, the excuse that they all enjoyed very healthy appetites apparently not sufficing), so Albert Edward went forth to inspect the pack alone.

He came into Mess very late, looking hot and dishevelled.

"My word, they've looted a blooming menagerie," he panted in my ear; "still, couldn't expect to pick Pytchley puppies off every bush, I suppose."

"What have they got, actually?" I inquired.

"Two couple of Belgian light-draught dogs--you know, the kind they hitch on to any load too heavy for a horse--an asthmatic beagle, an anæmic bloodhound, a domesticated wolf, an unfrocked poodle, and a sort of dropsical pug."

"What on earth is the pug for?" I asked.

"Luck," said Albert Edward. "Your henchman says 'them kind of little dogs do be bringing ye luck,' and backs it up with a very convincing yarn of an uncle of his in Bally-something who had a lucky dog--'as like this wan here as two spits, except maybe for the least little curliness of the tail'--which provided complete immunity from ghosts, witches' evil and ingrowing toe-nails. I thought it cheap at five francs."

"But, good Lord, that lot'll never hunt hares," I protested.

"Won't they?" said Albert Edward grimly. "With the only meal they'll ever see prancing along in front of them, and you and me prancing along behind scourging 'em with scorpions, I rather fancy they will. By the way, I know you won't mind, but I've had to shift your bed out under the chestnut-tree; it's really quite a good tree as trees go."

"But why can't I stop in my hen-house?" I objected.

"Because I've just moved the pack there," said he.

"But why?" I went on. "What's the matter with the ice-house?"

"That's just it," he hissed in my ear; "it isn't an ice-house--never was; it's the De Valcourt family vault."

The next day being propitious, we decided to hold our first meet that evening, and issued a few invitations. The Veterinary Bloke and the Field Cashier promised to show up, likewise the Padre, once the sacredness of our cause had been explained to him.

At noon "stables" Albert Edward reported the pack in fine fettle. "Kicking up a fearful din and look desperate enough to hunt a holy angel," said he. "At five o'clock, me lad, Hard forrard! Tally-ho! and Odds-boddikins!"

However at 4.45 p.m., just as I was mounting, he appeared in my lines wearing slacks and a very downcast expression.

"Wash-out," he growled; "they've been fed and are now lying about, blown up and dead to the world."

"But who the devil fed them?" I thundered.

"They fed themselves," said Albert Edward. "They ate the blooming lucky dog at half-past four."

We therefore postponed the hunt until the morrow; but cannibalism (so cannibals assure me), once indulged in, becomes as absorbing as morphia or jig-saws, and at two-fifteen the next afternoon my groom reported the beagle to have gone the way of the pug, and the pack once more dead to the world.

There was nothing for it but to postpone the show yet again, and tie up each hound separately as a precaution against further orgies.

However it seemed to have become a habit with them, for the moment they were unleashed on the evening of the third day they turned as one dog upon the poodle.

I wiped the bloodhound's nose for him with a deft swipe of my whip lash, and Albert Edward's charger anchored the domesticated wolf by treading firmly on its tail, all of which served to give the fugitive a few seconds' start; and then a wave of mad dog dashed between our horses' legs and was on his trail screaming for gore.

The poodle heard the scream and did not dally, but got him hence with promptitude and agility. He streaked across the orchard, leading by five lengths; but the good going across the park reduced his advantage. He dived through the fence hard pressed and, with the bloodhound's hot breath singeing his tail feathers, leaped into the back of a large farm-cart which happened, providentially for him, to be meandering down the broad highway.

In the shafts of the cart was a sleepy fat Percheron mare. On the seat was a ponderous farmeress, upholstered in respectable black and crowned with a bead bonnet. They were probably making a sentimental excursion to the ruins of their farm. I know not; but I do know that the fat mare was suddenly shocked out of a pleasant drowse to find herself the centre of a frenzied pack of wolves, bloodhounds and other dog-hooligans, and, not liking the look of things, promptly bolted.

Albert Edward and I dropped over the low hedge to see the cart disappearing down the road in a whirl of dust pursued by our vociferous harriers.

The fat farmeress, her bonnet wobbling over one ear, was tugging manfully at the reins and howling to Saint Lazarus of Artois to put on the brakes. Over the tail-board protruded the head of the poodle, yelping derision at his baffled enemies.

People will tell you Percherons cannot gallop; can't they? Believe me that grey mare flitted like a startled gazelle. At all events she was too good for our pack, whom we came upon a mile distant, lying on their backs in a ditch, too exhausted to do anything but put their tongues out at us, while far away we could see a small cloud of dust careering on towards the horizon.

"God help the Traffic Controlman at the next corner," Albert Edward mused; "he'll never know what struck him. Well, that was pretty cheery while it lasted, what? To see that purler the Padre took over the garden-wall was alone worth the money."

"Oh, well, I suppose we'd best herd these perishers home to kennels while they're still too weak to protest. Come on."

"And in the meanwhile the festive _lapin_ breeds and breeds," said Albert Edward.

XXXI

THE HARRIERS (II)

Albert Edward and I were seated on a log outside the hen-house which kennelled our pack when we perceived Algy, the A.D.C., tripping daintily towards us. Albert Edward blew a kiss. "Afternoon, Algy. How _chit_ he looks in his pink and all! Tell me, do people ever mistake you for a cinema attendant and give you pennies?"

"Afternoon, Algy," said I. "Been spending a strenuous morn carrying the old man's respirator--with his lunch inside?"

For answer Algy tipped me backwards off the log, and sitting down in my place, contemplated our hounds for some seconds.

"And are these the notorious Hare-'em Scare-'ems?" he inquired.

I nodded. "Yessir; absolutely the one and only pack of harriers operating in the war zone. Guaranteed gun-broke, shell-shocked, shrapnel-pitted and bullet-bitten."

Algy sniffed. "What's that big brute over in the corner, he of the crumpled face and barbed smile? Looks like a bloodhound."

"Is a bloodhound," said Albert Edward. "If you don't believe me step inside and behave like raw rump steak for a moment."

Algy pointed his cane. "And that creature industriously delousing itself? That's a wolf, of course?"

"Its wolfery is only skin-deep," said I. "A grey gander all but annihilated it yesterday. In my opinion it's a sheep in wolf's clothing."

Algy wagged his cane, indicating the remaining two couples.

"And these? What breed would you call them?"

Albert Edward grunted. "You could call them any breed you like and be partly right. We've named them 'The Maconochies,' which, being interpreted, meaneth a little of everything."

"And how many hares have you killed?" Algy inquired.

"We haven't exactly killed any as yet," said I, "but we've put the breeze up 'em; their _moral_ is very low."

"Well, my bold Nimrods," said Algy, "I'm sorry to say the game is up."

"What do you mean by 'game'?" objected Albert Edward. "I've told you before that this is a serious attempt to avert a plague of rodents. Why, in Australia I've seen----"

Algy held up his hand.

"I know, I know. But some people who have not enjoyed your harrowing Colonial experience are a trifle sceptical. Listen. Last evening, as I was driving home with the old man through Vaux-le-Tour, whom should I see but you two sportsmen out on the hillside riding down a hare, followed at some distance by three mounted bargees----"

"The Padre, the Field Cashier and O.C. Bugs," Albert Edward explained. "We're making men of 'em. Go on."

--"followed at a still greater distance," continued Algy, "by a raging band of mongrels. By the way, don't you get your hunt the wrong way round, the cart before the horse, so to speak? I always thought it customary for the hounds to go first."

"In some cases the hare wouldn't know it was being hunted if they did," said I. "This is one of them. Forge ahead."

"Well, so far so good; the old gent was drowsing in his corner and there was no harm done."

"So you gave him a dig in the ribs, I suppose, and bleated, 'Oh, look at naughty boys chasing ickle bunny wabbit!'" sneered Albert Edward.

Algy wagged his head. "Not me. You woke him up yourself, my son, by tootling on your little tin trumpet. He heard it through his dreams, shot up with a 'Good Lord, what's that?' popped his head out of the window and saw the brave cavalcade reeling out along the sky-line like a comic movie. He drank in the busy scene, then turned to me and said----"

Albert Edward interrupted. "I know exactly what he said. He said, 'Algy, me boy, that's the spirit. _Vive le sport_! How it reminds us of our young days in the Peninsular! Oft-times has our cousin of Wellington remarked to us how Waterloo was won on the playing----'"

Algy cut off the flow and continued with his piece. "He said to me, 'God bless my soul, if those young devils aren't galloping a hare!' I said, 'Sir, they maintain that they are doing good work by averting a threatened plague of rodents, a state of affairs which has proved very detrimental to the Anti-podes.'

"'Threatened plague of grandmothers!' replied the old warrior. 'They're enjoying themselves, that's what they're doing--having a splendid time. Mind you, I've no objection to you young chaps amusing yourselves _in secret_, but this is too damn flagrant altogether. Just imagine the hullabaloo in the House if word of these goings-on got home. "B.E.F. enjoying themselves! Don't they know there's a war on? _Cherchez le général_ and off with his head!" Trot round and see your dog-fancying friends and tell 'em that if they're fond of good works I recommend crochet.' Thus the General. I must be off now, got to take the old bird up to have a peep at the War. Good-byee."

Algy tripped daintily off home again, twirling his cane and whistling cheerfully. Sourly we watched him depart.

"I believe that youth positively revels in spreading gloom," Albert Edward growled. "Oh, well, I suppose we'll have to get rid of the dogs now. Orders is orders."

"But do you think they'll go?" I asked. "We've been feeding 'em occasionally of late."

"We'll herd 'em down to where they can get wind of the infantry cookers," said Albert Edward; "once they sniff the rare old stew they'll forget all about us."

Accordingly an hour later we released our pack from the hen-house for the last time. They immediately gave chase to an errant tabby kitten, which threw off a noise like many siphons and shot up a tree, baffling them completely. We speedily herded them out of the château grounds, Albert Edward ambling in front, wringing mournful music out of his horn, and I bringing up the rear, snapping my whip-cracker under the sterns of the laggards. We had no sooner left the park for the open grass country beyond when up jumped a buck hare, right from under our feet, and away went the pack rejoicing, bass and falsetto.

Albert Edward tugged his excited mare to a standstill. "Look at those blighters!" he shouted. "Hunting noses down in pukka style for the first time, just because they know we can't follow them. Oh, this is too much!"

"I don't see why we shouldn't follow them at a distance," said I. "We can pretend there's no connection--there is no connection really, we didn't lay 'em on. They're hunting on their own. We're just out for a ride."

Albert Edward winked an eye at me and gave his mare her head. The pack by this time was well across the plain, the wolf leading, noisily supported by the Maconochies and the bloodhound. Thrice the hare turned clear and squatted, but, thanks to the blood dog's infallible nose, he was ousted each time and pushed on, failing visibly. He made a sharp curve towards the windmill, and Albert Edward and I topped the miller's fence in time to see the Maconochies roll him over among the weeds. We also saw something on the highway behind the mill which we had not previously noticed, namely a grey Limousine. On a fallen tree by the wayside sat the General, his face as highly coloured as his hat. Towards us down the garden-path tripped Algy, twirling his cane and whistling cheerily. Albert Edward groaned.

"Something in the demeanour of yon youth tells me he beareth our death-warrants. Here, you hold the horses while I feed the guillotine. This is by far, far the best thing that I have ever done."

He slung his reins and tottered to his doom. I watched him approach within five yards of the old man when a strange thing happened. The General suddenly uttered a loud cry and, leaping to his feet, commenced to dance up and down the road, tearing and belabouring himself and swearing so outrageously that I had difficulty in holding the horses. His chauffeur and Algy rushed to his side, and they and Albert Edward grouped in a sympathetic circle while he danced and raved and beat himself in their midst. Presently the air seemed to be full of flying tunics, shirts, camisoles, etc., and a second later I beheld the extraordinary spectacle of a Lieutenant-General dancing practically nude (expecting for his cap and boots) in the middle of a French highway, while two subalterns and a private smacked him all over, and most heartily. For nearly a minute it continued, and then he seemed to get himself under control and was led away by Algy to his car, the chauffeur following, retrieving apparel off trees and bushes. Albert Edward, one quivering smirk, wobbled up and took his reins. "By Jove! saved again. He can't very well bite the hand that spanked him, can he?"

"But what on earth was the matter?" I asked. "A fit, religious mania, a penance--what?"

"He sat on a waspodrome," said Albert Edward, "and they got on his tail."

XXXII

THE CAMERA CANNOT LIE

When I was young I was extremely handsome. I have documentary evidence to prove as much. There is in existence a photograph of a young gentleman standing with his back to a raging seascape, one hand resting lightly on a volume of Shakespeare, which in turn is supported by a rustic table. The young gentleman has wide innocent eyes, a rosebud mouth and long golden curls (the sort poor dear old Romney used to do so nicely). For the rest he is tastefully upholstered in a short-panted velvet suit, a lace collar and white silk socks. "_Little Lord Fauntleroy_," you murmur to yourself. No, Sir (or Madam), it is ME--or was me, rather. When I was young no girl thought herself properly married unless I was present at the ceremony, got up like a prize rabbit and tethered to the far end of her train. Nowadays I am not so handsome. True, you can urge a horse past me without blindfolding it and all that, but nobody ever mistakes me for Maxine Elliott.

Personally I was quite willing to be represented at the National Portrait Gallery by a coloured copy of the presentment described above, but my home authorities thought otherwise, and when last I was in England on leave--shortly after the Battle of Agincourt--they shooed me off to Valpré. "Go to Valpré," they said; "he is so artistic." So to Valpré I went, and was admitted by a handmaid who waved a white hand vaguely towards a selection of doors, murmuring, "Wait there, please." I opened the nearest door at a venture and entered.

In the waiting-room three other handmaids were at work on photographs. One was painting dimples on a lady's cheek; one filling in gaps in a Second-Lieutenant's moustache; one straightening the salient of a stockbroker's waistcoat. Presently the first handmaid reappeared and somewhat curtly (I was waiting in the wrong room, it seemed) informed me that the Master was ready. So I went upstairs to the operating theatre. After an impressive interval a curtain was thrust aside and the Master entered. He was not in the least like the artist of my first photograph, who had chirruped and done tricks with an indiarubber monkey to make me prick my ears and appear sagacious. This man had the mane of a poodle, a plush smoking-jacket with rococo trimmings, satin cravat, rings and bangles like the lads in _La Bohème_, and I knew myself to be in the presence of True Art, and bowed my head.

At the sight of me he winced visibly; didn't seem to like my looks at all. However he pulled himself together and advanced to reconnoitre. He pushed me into a chair, manipulated some screws at the back, and I found my head fast in a steel clamp. I pleaded for gas or cocaine, but he took no notice and prowled off to the far end of the theatre to observe if distance would lend any enchantment. Apparently it would not. The more he saw of me the less he seemed to admire the view.

Suddenly the fire of inspiration lit his eye and he came for me. I struggled with the clamp, but it clave like a bull-terrier to a mutton chop. In a moment he had me by the head and started to mould it nearer to his heart's desire with plump powerful hands. He crammed half my lower jaw into my breast pocket, pinned my ears back so tightly that they wouldn't wag for weeks, pressed my nose down with his thumb as though it were the button of an electric bell and generally kneaded my features from the early Hibernian to the late Græco-Roman. Then, before they could rebound to their normal positions, he had sprung back, jerked the lanyard and fired the camera.

Some weeks later the finished photographs arrived. The handmaids had done their bit, and the result was a pleasing portraiture, an _objet d'art_, an ornament to anybody's family album. The man Valpré was an artist all right.

A few days ago the Skipper whistled me into the orderly room. His table was littered with parade states, horse-registers and slips of cardboard, all intermingled. The Skipper himself appeared to be undergoing some heavy mental disturbance. His forehead was furrowed, his toupet rumpled, and he sucked his fountain-pen, unconsciously imbibing much dark nourishment.

"Identification cards," he explained, indicating the slips. "Got to carry 'em now. Comply with Italian regulations. Been trying to describe you. Napoo." He prodded the result towards me. I scanned it and decided he had got it mixed with horse-registers. It read as follows:--

Born . . . . . . . Yes. Height . . . . . . 17 hands. Hair . . . . . . . Bay. Eyes . . . . . . . Two. Nose . . . . . . . Undulating. Moustache . . . . Hogged. Complexion . . . . Natural. Special Marks . .

The Skipper pointed to the blank space. "That's what I want to know--special marks. Got any? Snip, blaze, white fetlock, anything?"

"Yessir," said I. "Strawberry patch on off gaskin."

He sucked thoughtfully at his fountain-pen. "Mmph," he said, "shouldn't mention it if I were you. Don't want to have to undress in the middle of the street every time you meet an Intelligence, do you?" I agreed that I did not--not before June, anyhow. The Skipper turned to the card again and frowned.

"Couldn't call it a speaking likeness exactly, this little pen-picture of you, could one? If you only had a photograph of yourself now."

"I have, Sir," said I brightly.

"Good Lord, man, why didn't you say so before? Here, take this and paste the thing in. Now trot away."

I trotted away and pasted Valpré's _objet d'art_ on to the card.

Yesterday evening Albert Edward and I were riding out of a certain Italian town (no names, no pack drill). Albert Edward got involved in a right-of-way argument between five bullock wagons and two lorries, and I jogged on ahead. On the fringe of the town was a barrier presided over by a brace of Carabinieri caparisoned with war material, whiskers and cocked hats of the style popularised by Bonaparte. Also an officer. As I moved to pass the barrier the officer spied me and, not liking my looks (as I hinted before, nobody does), signed to me to halt. Had I an identification card, please? I had and handed it to him. He took the card and ran a keen eye over the Skipper's little pen-picture and Valpré's "Portrait Study," then over their alleged original. "Lieutenant," said he grimly, "these don't tally. This is not you."