The Pothunters, P. G. Wodehouse [digital book reader .TXT] 📗

in their leggings and heavy boots. Barrett raced on. Close behind him a crashing in the undergrowth and the sound of heavy breathing told him that keeper number one was doing his best. To left and right similar sounds were to be heard. But Barrett had placed these competitors out of the running at once. The race was between him and the man behind.

Fifty yards of difficult country, bushes which caught his clothes as if they were trying to stop him in the interests of law and order, branches which lashed him across the face, and rabbit holes half hidden in the bracken, and still he kept his lead. He was increasing it. He must win now. The man behind was panting in deep gasps, for the pace had been warm and he was not in training. Barrett cast a glance over his shoulder, and as he looked the keeper’s foot caught in a hole and he fell heavily. Barrett uttered a shout of triumph. Victory was his.

In front of him was a small hollow fringed with bushes. Collecting his strength he cleared these with a bound. Then another of the events of this eventful afternoon happened. Instead of the hard turf, his foot struck something soft, something which sat up suddenly with a yell. Barrett rolled down the slope and halfway up the other side like a shot rabbit. Dimly he recognised that he had jumped on to a human being. The figure did not wear the official velveteens. Therefore he had no business in the Dingle. And close behind thundered the keeper, now on his feet once more, dust on his clothes and wrath in his heart in equal proportions. “Look out, man!” shouted Barrett, as the injured person rose to his feet. “Run! Cut, quick! Keeper!” There was no time to say more. He ran. Another second and he was at the top, over the railing, and in the good, honest, public high road again, safe. A hoarse shout of “Got yer!” from below told a harrowing tale of capture. The stranger had fallen into the hands of the enemy. Very cautiously Barrett left the road and crept to the railing again. It was a rash thing to do, but curiosity overcame him. He had to see, or, if that was impossible, to hear what had happened.

For a moment the only sound to be heard was the gasping of the keeper. After a few seconds a rapidly nearing series of crashes announced the arrival of the man from the right flank of the pursuing forces, while almost simultaneously his colleague on the left came up.

Barrett could see nothing, but it was easy to understand what was going on. Keeper number one was exhibiting his prisoner. His narrative, punctuated with gasps, was told mostly in hoarse whispers, and Barrett missed most of it.

“Foot (gasp) rabbit ’ole.” More gasps. “Up agen⁠ ⁠… minute⁠ ⁠… (indistinct mutterings)⁠ ⁠… and (triumphantly) cotched ’im!”

Exclamations of approval from the other two. “I assure you,” said another voice. The prisoner was having his say. “I assure you that I was doing no harm whatever in this wood. I.⁠ ⁠…”

“Better tell that tale to Sir Alfred,” cut in one of his captors.

“ ’E’ll learn yer,” said the keeper previously referred to as number one, vindictively. He was feeling shaken up with his run and his heavy fall, and his temper was proportionately short.

“I swear I’ve heard that voice before somewhere,” thought Barrett. “Wonder if it’s a Coll. chap.”

Keeper number one added something here, which was inaudible to Barrett.

“I tell you I’m not a poacher,” said the prisoner, indignantly. “And I object to your language. I tell you I was lying here doing nothing and some fool or other came and jumped on me. I.⁠ ⁠…”

The rest was inaudible. But Barrett had heard enough.

“I knew I’d heard that voice before. Plunkett, by Jove! Golly, what is the world coming to, when heads of Houses and School prefects go on the poach! Fancy! Plunkett of all people, too! This is a knockout, I’m hanged if it isn’t.”

From below came the sound of movement. The keepers were going down the hill again. To Barrett’s guilty conscience it seemed that they were coming up. He turned and fled.

The hedge separating Sir Alfred Venner’s land from the road was not a high one, though the drop the other side was considerable. Barrett had not reckoned on this. He leapt the hedge, and staggered across the road. At the same moment a grey-clad cyclist, who was pedalling in a leisurely manner in the direction of the School, arrived at the spot. A collision seemed imminent, but the stranger in a perfectly composed manner, as if he had suddenly made up his mind to take a sharp turning, rode his machine up the bank, whence he fell with easy grace to the road, just in time to act as a cushion for Barrett. The two lay there in a tangled heap. Barrett was the first to rise.

IX Enter the Sleuthhound

“I’m awfully sorry,” he said, disentangling himself carefully from the heap. “I hope you’re not hurt.”

The man did not reply for a moment. He appeared to be laying the question before himself as an impartial judge, as who should say: “Now tell me candidly, are you hurt? Speak freely and without bias.”

“No,” he said at last, feeling his left leg as if he were not absolutely easy in his mind about that, “no, not hurt, thank you. Not much, that is,” he added with the air of one who thinks it best to qualify too positive a statement. “Left leg. Shin. Slight bruise. Nothing to signify.”

“It was a rotten thing to do, jumping over into the road like that,” said Barrett. “Didn’t remember there’d be such a big drop.”

“My fault in a way,” said the man. “Riding wrong side of road. Out for a run?”

“More or less.”

“Excellent thing.”

“Yes.”

It occurred to Barrett that it was only due to the man on whom he had