They were in open country once more and the fox was in view. There were screeches, hounds yelling, and all the climax of the chase, but there were oaths, too, for with the fox was a man on horseback, and he had the fox on a long lead.

‘Good God! It’s that scoundrel Ed Brown!’ said Jonathan, breaking into wild laughter. ‘It’s his tame fox he’s got there! We always suspected he had one or two, although he’d never own to it. What on earth is his game? And where the devil did he get a horse like – Damn it all! It’s my Moonlighter!’

Observing that the game, whatever it was, was up, Ed leaned from the saddle like a cowboy, and released the fox. It immediately disappeared, and Ed himself dismounted, while the Huntsman and the Master, calling upon all disembodied spirits, rode up to him to know the how and why.

Ed seemed confused. His sly eyes caught Mrs Bradley’s alert and interested ones, and, apparently discerning sympathy in her yellow countenance, he addressed himself to her.

‘Please, mam, you be the best judge of what I bin doin’. You do know who’s arter me and for why.’

‘Yes,’ said Mrs Bradley, whom the Master was eyeing askance while the Huntsman was persuading hounds to come away from the mouth of the artificially constructed ‘earth’ where Ed’s tame vixen had gone to ground. ‘I think, Ed, that we must forgive you. Where is Robert Emming now?’

‘I dunno, mam,’ said Ed. ‘He daren’t touch me while the hunt was going on, in case ’e should shoot an ’ound – or maybe the fox.’ He smiled shyly at the fermenting Master and then at Jonathan, who, pointing to the horse, asked wrathfully:

‘Who gave you leave to borrow Moonlighter, confound you?’

‘I don’t understand your tale,’ said the Master, before Ed could reply. ‘What’s all this about shooting hounds and foxes?’

‘Perhaps I had better explain,’ said Mrs Bradley. ‘Ed, the evidence of your crime is not very securely hidden. Look!’ And she showed him the blood-stained stick. ‘But I do not advise you to return that way at present.’

‘He were after me, and I knowed it,’ said Ed, almost sullenly. ‘I rate meself higher than one old fox, I reckon.’

‘So you did kill our fox, you villain!’ said the Master.

‘I had to lead him a dance,’ protested Ed. ‘He were arter me, I tell ee.’

‘Nonsense, Ed,’ said Mrs Bradley firmly. ‘You’ve got a bee in your bonnet. Mr Emming and Mr Tiny Fullalove are still in London. What put such a notion into your silly noddle?’

‘It was a dream I ’ad,’ said Ed unwillingly. ‘(It’s all right, Mr Bradley, sir. Me and your Moonlighter’s old friends.) I don’t ’old with takin’ no notice of dreams. Dreams is in the Bible, and allus took notice of there, being interpreted.’