THE HAUNTED HUNT 13 



but the bellringers were practising in Frogbere Church, 

 and the sound, echoing from both sides of the valley, lent 

 itself to any construction the imagination liked to put 

 upon it. 



" ' They're in there,' said the huntsman, * I heard them 

 before the bells began. And there's some one hunting 

 them ! ' 



" Some one hunting them ! At this piece of informa- 

 tion the notion flashed across me that I had come all this 

 way on a wild-goose chase. What more likely than that 

 some one had nicked in with them, probably when the 

 fox had swung out to Checkley and back to Cockover 

 Wood ? And had I read aright the riddle of the returning 

 tracks in Cockover Wood ? I was convinced that I had 

 been following a single line of tracks and that those 

 belonged to Pride of Tyrone. ' But,' I said to myself, ' I 

 am not a Red Indian, and it is quite possible that I have 

 made a mistake somewhere in spite of all my care.' 

 After all, was it probable that any horse, least of all a 

 young one who had that season seen hounds for the first 

 time, would, of his own free will and riderless, stick to 

 them all through a run like that, jumping everything as 

 it came and the Teal as well ? The more I reasoned the 

 more absurd did the idea seem. 



" As we sat there straining our ears, a labourer came 

 down the lane from the direction of the wood. ' The 

 Hounds ? ' he said in answer to our questions. * Yes, 

 they've been up there hunting about in the big wood this 

 half-hour. Yes, there's some one with them, I heard him. 

 No, I didn't see him ; I saw some of the dogs ; and there's 

 a horse that's lost his master.' 



" We rode up the lane and turned into the wood. 



