thumped and frolicked.

"Whew! What a place! Talk of natural history; this is it," said Stalky,
filling himself a pipe. "Isn't it scrumptious? Good old sea!" He spat
again approvingly, and was silent.

McTurk and Beetle had taken out their books and were lying on their
stomachs, chin in hand. The sea snored and gurgled; the birds, scattered
for the moment by these new animals, returned to their businesses, and
the boys read on in the rich, warm, sleepy silence.

"Hullo, here's a keeper," said Stalky, shutting "Handley Cross"
cautiously, and peering through the jungle. A man with a gun appeared on
the sky-line to the east. "Confound him, he's going to sit down."

"He'd swear we were poachin', too," said Beetle. "What's the good of
pheasants' eggs? They're always addled, too."

"Might as well get up to the wood, I think," said Stalky. "We don't want
G. M. Dabney, Col., J.P., to be bothered about us so soon. Up the wuzzy
and keep quiet! He may have followed us, you know."

Beetle was already far up the tunnel. They heard him gasp indescribably:
there was the crash of a heavy body leaping through the furze.

"Aie! yeou little red rascal. I see yeou!" The keeper threw the gun to
his shoulder, and fired both barrels in their direction. The pellets
dusted the dry stems round them as a big fox plunged between Stalky's
legs, and ran over the cliff-edge.

They said nothing till they reached the wood, torn, disheveled, hot, but
unseen.

"Narrow squeak," said Stalky. "I'll swear some of the pellets went
through my hair."

"Did you see him?" said Beetle. "I almost put my hand on him. Wasn't
he a wopper! Didn't he stink! Hullo, Turkey, what's the matter? Are you
hit?"

McTurk's lean face had turned pearly white; his mouth, generally half
open, was tight shut, and his eyes blazed. They had never seen him like
this save once in a sad time of civil war.

"Do you know that that was just as bad as murder?" he said, in a grating
voice, as he brushed prickles from his head.

"Well, he didn't hit us," said Stalky. "I think it was rather a lark.
Here, where are you going?"

"I'm going up to the house, if there is one," said McTurk, pushing
through the hollies. "I am going to tell this Colonel Dabney."

"Are you crazy? He'll swear it served us jolly well right. He'll report
us. It'll be a public lickin'. Oh, Turkey, don't be an ass! Think of
us!"

"You fool!" said McTurk, turning savagely. "D'you suppose I'm thinkin'
of