The Torch and Other Tales

t to happen; and if it don't happen, then you'm a bit fretful about it, and reckon there's a screw loose somewhere in the order of things. For instance, I be a gamekeeper

as Nature meant 'em; and, again, it may be just a wild bird, as never came out of no boughten egg at all, but belonged to the country, like his father and his grandfather afore him. And so 'tis common property, same as the land did ought to be, and if I be clever enough to catch 'un and kill 'un-why, so much the better for me! All for free trade

ld woods up over-cold and [275] rocky and better liked by the foxes than the pheasants. But the birds done very well half a mile lower down, and the river t

from father to son, for my grandfather had been a gamekeeper, and my father a water-bailiff, and my uncle-my father's brother-a huntsman. That was the line of life I'd thirsted for, or even to go for a jockey. But Natu

as day, I was down beside it a bit after one o'clock, busy about a little matter of night-lines. I meant to make an experiment, too, because I'd read in a book how the salmon will come up to stare if you hold a bright light

moths, but nothing moved of any account in the open, and I pushed forward where the hayfield ended at the edge of the woods. There, just fifty yards inside the trees, was one of the properest pools on the river; and, having set my night-lines for

unning about all day, that not a keeper would be to work after dark. A very good man had been the Squire, though peppery and uncertain in his temper, and quick to take offence, but honest and well-lik

to mark him, and I saw he was a tall, slim man, much lighter than me, though very near the same height. He didn't tally with my knowledge of any of the Woodcotes keepers, so I felt better and hoped as it might be a stranger, or a lunatic, or somebody as wouldn't be feeling any interest in me. But I had to shift, of course, so I nipped off my rock and wen

went young Mister Cranston Champernowne, the nephew of the dead man, and thought to be heir to Woodcotes! For Squire never married, but he had a good few nephews, and two was his special favourites: this one

'Twas black and shining, and I felt pretty sure 'twas a bottle; but I only had time to catch one glimpse of it, for he lifted his arm and flung it in the pool. It flashed and was gone, and

The bottom where his bottle was lying happened to be fine sand with a clear lift to the little beach; and so, given

o mind my own business and leave Cranston Champernowne to mind his. Yet somehow I couldn't do that. There was a sporting side to i

At the second drag I got him, and there, sure enough, was the thing that Mister Champernowne had throwed in the pool. But it weren't a bottle by no means. Instead, I found a black, tin, waterproof canister a foot long; and, working at it, the lid soon came off. Inside was one piece of paper and no more. That was all the can

t you add to a will. And it revoked and denied everything as the dead man had wrote before. In a few words the paper swept away Squire Champernowne's former will

himself the heir, and reckoned 'twas all cut and dried. Then, rummaging here and there after his uncle was gone, he'd come upon this

feeling in my mind was not to be on the make. No, I swear to you I only felt sorry for the young chap as had done this terrible deed. I was troubled for him, and considered very like the temptation was too great, that he'd just fallen into it in a natural fit of rage at his disappointment, and that presently, when he came to his senses, he'd bitterly mourn such a hookem-snivey deed. For, of course, Champernownes were great folk, high above any small or mean actions, and with the [279] fame of the family always set up afore them. Yes, I thought it all out, and saw his mind working, and felt so sure as death that a time would come when

or two-just a voice he should hear out of the night. I might save his soul, and, whether or no, 'twas a sporting idea to try to do so

by following over a hill and dropping down t'other side, I could get in his track again and be at the edge of the h

the night and headed him off, and hid in a rhododendron bush just by the main drive, where he'd leave the woods on his way home. And right in hi

ad hooted an owl. "Hoo-hoo-hoo! Hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo!" he s

ded a thing my father used to speak when I was a li'l one. He'd tell it out very serious, and being poetry made it still more so. "Don't you do it, else you'll rue it!" That's what my father used to tell me a sc

creature he crept from the woods; his face was white, and misery stared out of it. Presently he looked upward at the moon, while he walked along like an old, tired man. And when I see his face, I was terrible glad I'd took such a lot of trouble for him, because 'twas properly ravaged with suffe

nt the owl. Then, the moment he st

, or else you'll

o think he'd heard but one voice, and that the owl was telling to him! I'm sure it must have been lik

, there it lay, glittering like a star-the very item [281] he'd thrown in the deepest part of the river not an hour afore! Then he crept towards it very slow, as if 'twas a snake; and he bent and touched it and found it to be a real thing and not a dream. With that he picked it up and strained his ears to listen

idy man-as poachers mostly are-I took the hayrake back to the field and wound up my lines. Then I went home, for 'twas pe

heir to Woodcotes and the farms and all. And next time I was out and about on the river according to my custom, I heard the owl hollering, and I said to the owl: "You and me had our trouble for nought

oes-"Hoo-hoo-hoo