Part 18 (2/2)

But Jem was in his place, and in another moment a long whoop came ringing down the glen, and the shrill yelping rally of the hounds as they all opened on a view together! Fiercer and wilder grew the hubbub!

And now the eager watcher might hear the brushwood torn in all directions by the impetuous pa.s.sage of the wild deer and his inveterate pursuers.

”Now, then, it is old Tom's chance, or ours,” he thought, ”for he will not try Forester again, I warrant him, and we are all down wind of him-- so he can't judge of our whereabouts.”

In another second the bushes crashed to his left hand, and behind him, while the dogs were raving scarcely a pistol-shot off, in the tangled swamp. Yet he well knew that if the stag should break there it would be A---'s shot, and, though anxious, he kept his eye fixed steadily on his own point, holding his good piece c.o.c.ked and ready.

”Mark! Harry, mark him!”--a loud yell from the Commodore.

The stag had broken midway between them, in full sight of A---, and seeing him, had wheeled off to the right. He was now sweeping onward across the open field with high graceful bounds, tossing his antlered head aloft, as if already safe, and little hurt, if anything, by Jem Lyn's boasted shot of the last evening. The gray stood motionless, trembling, however, palpably, in every limb, with eagerness--his ears laid flat upon his neck, and cowering a little, as if he feared the shot, which it would seem his instinct told him to expect. Harry had dropped his reins once more, and leveled his unerring rifle--yet for a moment's s.p.a.ce he paused, waiting for A--- to fire; there was no hurry for himself, nay a few seconds more would give him a yet fairer shot, for the buck now was running partially toward him, so that a moment more would place him broadside on, and within twenty paces.

”Bang!” came the full and round report of A---'s large shotgun, fired before the beast was fifteen yards away from him. He had aimed at the head, as he was forced to do, lest he should spoil the haunches, for he was running now directly from him--and had the buck been fifty paces off he would have killed him dead, lodging his whole charge, or the best part of it, in the junction of the neck and skull--but as it was, the cartridge--the green cartridge--had not yet spread at all; nor had one buckshot left the case! Whistling like a single ball, as it pa.s.sed Harry's front eight or nine yards off, it drove, as his quick eye discovered, clean through the stag's right ear, almost dissevering it, and making the animal bound six feet off the green sward.

Just as he touched the earth again, alighting from his mighty spring, with an aim sure and steady, and a cool practiced finger, the marksman drew his trigger, and, quick, as light, the piece--well loaded, as its dry crack announced--discharged its ponderous missile! But, bad luck on it, even at that very instant, just in the point of time wherein the charge was ignited, eighteen or twenty quail, flushed by the hubbub of the hounds, rose with a loud and startling whirr, on every side of the gray horse, under his belly and about his ears, so close as almost to brush him with their wings--he bolted and reared up--yet even at that disadvantage the practiced rifleman missed not his aim entirely, though he erred somewhat, and the wound in consequence was not quite deadly.

The ball, which he had meant for the heart, his sight being taken under the fore-shoulder, was raised and thrown forward by the motion of the horse, and pa.s.sed clean through the neck close to the blade bone.

Another leap, wilder and loftier than the last! yet still the stag dashed onward, with the blood gus.h.i.+ng out in streams from the wide wound, though as yet neither speed nor strength appeared to be impaired, so fleetly did he scour the meadow.

”He will cross, Frank yet!” cried Archer. ”Mark! mark him, Forester!”

But, as he spoke, he set his rifle down against the fence, and halloaed to the hounds, which instantly, obedient to his well known and cheery whoop, broke covert in a body, and settled, heads up and sterns down, to the blazing scent.

At the same moment A--- came trotting out from his post, gun in hand; while at a thundering gallop, blaspheming awfully as he came on, and rating them for ”know-nothins, and blunderin' etarnal spoil-sports,” Tom rounded the farther hill, and spurred across the level. By this time they were all in sight of Forester, who stood on foot, close to his horse, in the mouth of the last gorge, the buck running across him sixty yards off, and quartering a little from him toward the road; the hounds were, however, all midway between him and the quarry, and as the ground sloped steeply from the marksman, he was afraid of firing low--but took a long, and, as it seemed, sure aim at the head.

The rifle flashed--a tine flew, splintered by the bullet, from the brow antler, not an inch above the eye.

”Give him the other!” shouted Archer. ”Give him the other barrel!”

But Frank shook his head spitefully, and dropped the muzzle of his piece.

”By thunder! then, he's forgot his bullets--and hadn't nothen to load up agen, when he missed the first time!”

”Ha! ha! ha!” roared once again the Commodore--”ha! ha! hah!--ha! ha!”

till rock and mountain rang again.

”By the Etarnal” exclaimed Draw, perfectly frantic with pa.s.sion and excitement--”By thunder! A---, I guess you'd laugh if your best friends was all a dyin' at your feet. You would for sartain! But look, look!

what the plague's Harry goin' at?”

For when he saw that Forester had now, for some reason or other, no farther means of stopping the stag's career, Archer had set spurs to his horse, and dashed away at a hard furious gallop after the wounded buck.

The hounds, which had lost sight of it as it leaped a high stone wall with much brush round the base of it, were running fast and furious on the scent--but still, though flagging somewhat in his speed, the stag was leaving them. He had turned, as the last shot struck his horns, down hill, as if to cross the valley; but immediately, as if perceiving that he had pa.s.sed the last of his enemies, turned up again toward the mountain, describing an arc, almost, in fact, a semi-circle, from the point where he had broken covert to that--another gully, at perhaps a short mile's distance--from which he was now aiming.

Across the chord, then, of this arc, Harry was driving furiously, with the intent, as it would seem, to cut him off from the gully--the stone wall crossed his line, but not a second did he pause for it, but gave his horse both spurs, and lifting him a little, landed him safely at the other side. Frank mounted rapidly, dashed after him, and soon pa.s.sed A---, who was less aptly mounted for a chase--he likewise topped the wall, and disappeared beyond it, though the stones flew, where the bay struck the coping with his heels.

All pluck to the back-bone, the Commodore craned not nor hesitated, but dashed the colt, for the first time in his life, at the high barrier--he tried to stop, but could not, so powerfully did his rider cram him-- leaped short, and tumbled head over heels, carrying half the wall away with him, and leaving a gap as if a wagon had pa.s.sed through it--to Tom's astonishment and agony--for he supposed the colt destroyed forever.

Scarcely, however, had A--- gained his feet, before a sight met his eyes, which made him leave the colt, and run as fast as his legs could carry him toward the scene of action.

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