“What do you think of hunting?” said Frank to his cousin.
“It’s divine!”
“My cousin went pretty well, I think,” he said to Lord George.
“Like a celestial bird of Paradise. No one ever went better;—or I believe so well. You’ve been carried rather nicely yourself.”
“Indeed I have,” said Frank, patting his still palpitating horse, “and he’s not to say tired now.”
“You’ve taken it pretty well out of him, sir,” said Carstairs. “There was a little bit of hill that told when we got over the brook. I know’d you’d find he’d jump a bit.”
“I wonder whether he’s to be bought?” asked Frank in his enthusiasm.
“I don’t know the horse that isn’t,” said Mr. Carstairs—“so long as you don’t stand at the figure.”
They were collected on the farm road, and now, as they were speaking, there was a commotion among the horses. A man, driving a little buggy, was forcing his way along the road, and there was a sound of voices, as though the man in the buggy were angry. And he was very angry. Frank, who was on foot by his horse’s head, could see that the man was dressed for hunting, with a bright red coat and a flat hat, and that he was driving the pony with a hunting-whip. The man was talking as he approached, but what he said did not much matter to Frank. It did not much matter to Frank till his new friend, Mr. Carstairs, whispered a word in his ear. “It’s Nappie, by gum!” Then there crept across Frank’s mind an idea that there might be trouble coming.
“There he is,” said Nappie, bringing his pony to a dead stop with a chuck, and jumping out of the buggy. “I say, you, sir; you’ve stole my ’orse!” Frank said not a word, but stood his ground with his hand on the nag’s bridle. “You’ve stole my ’orse; you’ve stole him off the rail. And you’ve been a-riding him all day. Yes, you ’ave. Did ever anybody see the like of this? Why, the poor beast can’t a’most stand!”
“I got him from Mr. MacFarlane.”
“MacFarlane be blowed! You didn’t do nothing of the kind. You stole him off the rail at Stewarton. Yes, you did;—and him booked to Kilmarnock. Where’s a police? Who’s to stand the like o’ this? I say, my lord—just look at this.” A crowd had now been formed round poor Frank, and the master had come up. Mr. Nappie was a Huddersfield man, who had come to Glasgow in the course of the last winter, and whose popularity in the hunting-field was not as yet quite so great as it perhaps might have been.
“There’s been a mistake, I suppose,” said the master.
“Mistake, my lord! Take a man’s ’orse off the rail at Stewarton, and him booked to Kilmarnock, and ride him to a standstill! It’s no mistake at all. It’s ’orse-nobbling; that’s what it is. Is there any police here, sir?” This he said, turning round to a farmer. The farmer didn’t deign any reply. “Perhaps you’ll tell me your name, sir? if you’ve got a name. No gen’leman ever took a gen’leman’s ’orse off the rail like that.”
“Oh, Frank, do come away,” said Lizzie, who was standing by.
“We shall be all right in two minutes,” said Frank.
“No, we shan’t,” said Mr. Nappie—“nor yet in two hours. I’ve asked what’s your name?”
“My name is—Greystock.”
“Greystockings,” said Mr. Nappie more angrily than ever. “I don’t believe in no such name. Where do you live?” Then somebody whispered a word to him. “Member of Parliament—is he? I don’t care a ⸻. A member of Parliament isn’t to steal my ’orse off the rail, and him booked to Kilmarnock. Now, my lord, what’d you do if you was served like that?” This was another appeal to the noble master.
“I should express a hope that my horse had carried the gentleman as he liked to be carried,” said the master.
“And he has—carried me remarkably well,” said Frank;—whereupon there was a loud laugh among the crowd.
“I wish he’d broken the infernal neck of you, you scoundrel, you—that’s what I do!” said Mr. Nappie. “There was my man, and my ’orse, and myself all booked from Glasgow to Kilmarnock;—and when I got there what did the guard say to me?—why, just that a man in a black coat had taken my horse off at Stewarton; and now I’ve been driving all about the country in that gig there for three hours!” When Mr. Nappie had got so far as this in his explanation he was almost in tears. “I’ll make ’im pay, that I will. Take your hand off my horse’s bridle, sir. Is there any gentleman here as would like to give two hundred and eighty guineas for a horse, and then have him rid to a standstill by a fellow like that down from London? If you’re in Parliament, why don’t you stick to Parliament? I don’t suppose he’s worth fifty pound this moment.”
Frank had all the while been endeavouring to explain the accident; how he had ordered a horse from Mr. MacFarlane, and the rest of it—as the reader will understand; but quite in vain. Mr. Nappie in his
