The voice of Mabbey said: 

“He was always a dark horse, Foliot:  It ’s always the dark horses that get let in for this kind of thing”; and there was a sound as though he licked his lips.

“They say,” said the voice of the host, “he never gives you back a greeting now.  Queer fish; they say that she’s devoted to him.”

Coming so closely on his meeting with this lady, and on the dream from which he had awakened, this conversation mesmerised the listener behind the hedge.

“If he gives up his huntin’ and his shootin’, I don’t see what the deuce he ’ll do; he’s resigned his clubs; as to his chance of Parliament—­” said the voice of Mabbey.

“Thousand pities,” said Sir James; “still, he knew what to expect.”

“Very queer fellows, those Foliots,” said the Commodore.  “There was his father:  he ’d always rather talk to any scarecrow he came across than to you or me.  Wonder what he’ll do with all his horses; I should like that chestnut of his.”

“You can’t tell what a fellow ’ll do,” said the voice of Mabbey—­“take to drink or writin’ books.  Old Charlie Wayne came to gazin’ at stars, and twice a week he used to go and paddle round in Whitechapel, teachin’ pothooks—­”

“Glennie,” said Sir James, “what ’s become of Smollett, your old keeper?”

“Obliged to get rid of him.”  Shelton tried again to close his ears, but again he listened.  “Getting a bit too old; lost me a lot of eggs last season.”

“Ah!” said the Commodore, “when they oncesh begin to lose eggsh—­”

“As a matter of fact, his son—­you remember him, Sir James, he used to load for you?—­got a girl into trouble; when her people gave her the chuck old Smollet took her in; beastly scandal it made, too.  The girl refused to marry Smollett, and old Smollett backed her up.  Naturally, the parson and the village cut up rough; my wife offered to get her into one of those reformatory what-d’ you-call-’ems, but the old fellow said she should n’t go if she did n’t want to.  Bad business altogether; put him quite off his stroke.  I only got five hundred pheasants last year instead of eight.”

There was a silence.  Shelton again peeped through the hedge.  All were eating pie.

“In Warwickshire,” said the Commodore, “they always marry—­haw—­and live reshpectable ever after.”

“Quite so,” remarked the host; “it was a bit too thick, her refusing to marry him.  She said he took advantage of her.”

“She’s sorry by this time,” said Sir James; “lucky escape for young Smollett.  Queer, the obstinacy of some of these old fellows!”

“What are we doing after lunch?” asked the Commodore.

“The next field,” said the host, “is pasture.  We line up along the hedge, and drive that mustard towards the roots; there ought to be a good few birds.”

“Shelton rose, and, crouching, stole softly to the gate: 

“On the twelfth, shootin’ in two parties,” followed the voice of Mabbey from the distance.