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Page 5
There is the tiny walled inclosure above the stables at Shaws, once used
as a milking-yard, and just now a veritable posy of daisies, buttercups,
rich green grass, and apple-blossom. For in it there are six or seven
gnarled and lichen-grown old apple-trees, whose fruit is of small
account, but whose bloom is a gift sent straight from heaven to gladden
the hearts of men and beasts, birds and bees. The big double doors in
the ivy-grown flint wall of this inclosure stood wide open. Humming bees
sailed booming to and fro, like ships in a tropical trade-wind. And
through the lattice-work of the gray old apple-trees' branches (so
virginally clothed just now) clean English sunshine dappled all the
earth and grass in moving checkers of light and shade.
When the Nuthill party looked in through the gates of this delectable
pleasaunce they beheld in its midst the Lady Desdemona, gazing solemnly
down her long nose at the moving checkers of sunlight on the grass. Her
head was held low--the true bloodhound poise--and that position
exaggerated the remarkable wealth of velvety "wrinkle" with which her
forehead had been endowed by nature, after the selective breeding of
centuries. Low hung her golden dewlap over the grass at her feet; and
all across the satin blackness of her saddle intricately woven little
patterns of sunlight flicked back and forth as the breeze stirred the
branches overhead.
"There's all the wisdom and philosophy of the ancients in her face,"
said the Master, as the beautiful young bloodhound bitch winded them and
raised her head.
As a fact, her thought had been far from abstruse. She was merely
watching the moving patches of sunlight, and not reflecting upon it as
humans do, but feeling the joyousness and beauty of that time and place.
She gave no thought to these matters, but was, as it were, inhaling
them, and enjoying them profoundly; more profoundly than most men-folk
would.
Finn eyed her gravely, appraisingly, yet also without thought. He, too,
had been unreflectingly absorbing the beauty of the morning; and now his
enjoyment became suddenly narrowed down and concentrated. The rest of
the world dropped out of the picture, or rather it became merged for
Finn in the picture he beheld of the Lady Desdemona; a study in tawny
orange-gold and jetty black, gleaming where the sun touched her and
embodying the quintessence of canine health, youth, and high-breeding.
So the world stood still for a moment while all concerned felt, without
thought, how good it was. Then her youth and sex spoke in the
bloodhound, and Lady Desdemona, head and stern uplifted now, came
passaging gaily, proudly forward down the grassy slope to the gateway,
entirely ignoring the human people, as was natural, and making direct
for Finn, the tallest, most stately representative of her own kind she
had ever seen. The Master stepped aside, with a smile, the better to
watch the meeting of the hounds. It was worth watching. Till they met,
the movement, the provocativeness was all on Lady Desdemona's side, Finn
standing erect and still as graven bronze. Then they met, and at a given
signal the tactics of each were sharply reversed. The signal consisted
of a little flicking contact, light as thistle-down. As Desdemona
curveted down past Finn the tip of her gaily-waving tail was allowed
once to glance over the Irish wolfhound's wiry coat; the merest
suggestion of a touch. But it seemed this was a magic signal, converting
the dancing Desdemona into a graven image and transforming the
statuesque Finn into a hound of abounding and commanding activity.
They made quite a notable picture. The Lady Desdemona stood now, tense,
rigid, immobile as any rock, though instinct with life in every hair.
Finn became the very personification of action, eager movement, alert
interest. Inside of one minute he had examined the motionless Desdemona
(by means of the most searchingly concentrated application of his senses
of sight and smell) at least as thoroughly as your Harley Street expert
examines a patient in half an hour. Finn needed no stethoscope to assure
him of Desdemona's soundness. But, having seen her in the inclosure, and
been interested so far, he now examined her with his keen eyes and
nostrils at close quarters, in order that he might know her. And so
superior to our own faculties are some of a hound's senses, that at the
end of this examination Finn the wolfhound actually did know Lady
Desdemona the bloodhound quite as thoroughly as humans know anybody
after a dozen or so of meetings and much beating of the air in speech.
This process ended, the two hounds turned and, with many friendly nudges
and shoulder-rubbings, proceeded up the meadow together in the wake of
the Nuthill party, toward the house of Shaws. One cannot translate
precisely Finn's remark to Desdemona at the end of the examination, but
the sense of it was probably something of this sort:
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