where it could,
and tugging valorously. Then it was that the Master arrived,
attracted by the noise of the youngsters' yapping, and the pups saw
no more of their victim.

[Illustration]

But this brought a new interest into Finn's life, and much of his
time now was spent in the neighbourhood of the rabbit earths. Many
glorious runs Finn had after venturesome rabbits in that corner of
the orchard, but he was not fleet enough as yet to catch them, and
possibly his jaws could hardly have managed the killing in any
case. But even so, he experienced great joy in the matter of
stalking, hunting, and lying in wait.

On a glorious mellow afternoon in September, when the four pups,
captained as usual by Finn, were having great fun with a hammock
chair, from which they had managed to tear the canvas, they looked
up suddenly, and not without some sense of shame, to see three
people strolling into the orchard from the garden with Tara. There
was the Master and the Mistress of the Kennels and a stately,
white-haired lady, who fondled Tara's beautiful head as she walked.
Tara was walking with great care and delicacy to make the fondling
easy. She had no idea who the lady might be, but yet remembered
having met her before upon more than one occasion. This was the
lady from Yorkshire who had been the generous means of restoring
Tara to the Master. She was staying now in Sussex for a few days,
and had been asked to come to the little house beside the downs to
see Tara's children. Tara was perfectly aware that this was the
object of the walk in the orchard, and, though she may have
forgotten that these puppies were her own offspring, she certainly
had a distinctly proprietary feeling where they were concerned, as
one could see from the modest, deprecatory expression on her face
when the youngsters came gambolling about her, and were duly
admired by the visitor.

"You have not disposed of any of them yet, then?" said the lady to
the Master. "Oh, no; I should not have thought of doing that until
you had an opportunity of making your choice," he replied.

"I? Oh, but, really, I--I----"

The lady from Yorkshire paused. For one thing she was not quite
sure whether the Master meant that he wished her to buy one of the
puppies, or whether he wanted to give one of them to her. She was a
wealthy lady, so that the monetary aspect of it did not exercise
her mind much, but she would not for the world have hurt the
Master's feelings.

"Bu