42 The Chase 



me. I live for what I can get. When I get a 

 chance I gorge. If I have a soul at all, it is so 

 rudimentary as to be unworthy of mention." 



In the silence that followed he looked at her 

 again with grim comprehension. " P'raps you 

 don't care for animals," he suggested cynically. 

 " To change the subject, do you know we are 

 leaving the hunt behind ? " 



She reined in somewhat reluctantly. " I suppose 

 we had better go back." 



" If your majesty decrees," said Nap. 



He pulled the mare round and stood motionless, 

 waiting for her to pass. He sat arrogantly at his 

 ease. She could not fail to note that his horse- 

 manship was magnificent. The mare stood royally 

 as if she bore a king. The man's very insignificance 

 of bulk seemed to make him the more superb. 



" Will you deign to lead the way ? " he said. 



And Anne passed him with a vague sense of 

 uneasiness that almost amounted to foreboding. For 

 it seemed to her as if for those few moments he had 

 imposed his will upon hers, had without effort 

 overthrown all barriers of conventional reserve, and 

 had made her acknowledge in him the mastery of 

 man. 



Rejoining the hunt, she made her first deliberate 

 attempt to avoid him, an attempt that was so far 

 successful that for the next hour she saw nothing of 

 him beyond casual glimpses. She did not join her 

 husband, for he resented her proximity in the 

 hunting-field. 



They drew blank in a wood above the first kill, 

 but finally found after considerable delay along a 

 stubbly stretch of ground bordering Baronmead, a 

 large estate that the eldest Errol had just bought. 



The fox headed straight for the Baronmead 



