m,
rippling over its pebbly bed, made a tender music that was wont to seem
passing sweet to Violet Tempest's ear. To-day she heard nothing, saw
nothing. Her brain was clouded with angry thoughts.

She left the Forest by-and-by, following one of the familiar
cart-tracks, and came out into the peaceful little colony of Beechdale,
where it was a chance if the noonday traveller saw anything alive
except a youthful family of pigs enjoying an oasis of mud in a dry
land, or an intrusive dog rushing out of a cottage to salute the
wayfarer with an inquiring bark. The children were still in school. The
hum or their voices was wafted from the open windows. The church door
stood open. The village graves upon the sunward-fronting slope were
bright with common flowers; the dead lying with their feet to the west,
ready to stand up and see their Lord at the resurrection morning.

Vixen hurried through the little village, not wanting to see Mrs.
Scobel, or anyone she knew, this morning. There was a long rustic lane
opposite the church, that led straight to the kennels.

"I will go and see the foxhounds," said Vixen. "They are true and
faithful. But perhaps all those I love best have been sold, or are dead
by this time."

It seemed to her ages since she had been to the kennels with her
father. It had been his favourite walk, out of the hunting season, and
he had rarely suffered a week to pass without making his visit of
inspection. Since her return Violet had carefully avoided the
well-known spot; but to-day, out of the very bitterness of her heart,
came a desire to renew past associations. Bullfinch was gone for ever,
but the hounds at least remained; and her father had loved them almost
as well as he had loved Bullfinch.

Nothing was changed at the kennels. The same feeder in corduroy and
fustian came out of the cooking-house when Vixen opened the five-barred
gate. The same groom was lounging in front of the stables, where the
horses were kept for the huntsman and his underlings. The whole place
had the same slumberous out-of-season look she remembered so well of
old in the days when hunting was over.

The men touched their caps to Miss Tempest as she passed them. She went
straight to the kennels. There were the three wooden doors, opening
into three square stone-paved yards, each door provided with a small
round eye-hole, through which the authorities might scrutinise the
assembly within. A loud yelping arose as Vixen's footste