“Oh, as to that, I assure you it is not so, my Lord,” answered Thibault in a tone of the most perfect sincerity.
“So much the better for your skin, my good fellow. Well, and now tell me what you were doing up there, perched on the top of that oak-tree?”
“My Lord can see himself,” answered Thibault, pointing to a few dry twigs lying here and there on the ground, “I was cutting a little dry wood for fuel.”
“Ah! I see. Now then, my good fellow, you will please tell us, without any beating about the bush, what has become of our deer.”
“By the devil, he ought to know, seeing that he has been perched up there so as not to lose any of its movements,” put in Marcotte.
“But I swear, my Lord,” said Thibault, “that I don’t know what it is you mean about this wretched buck.”
“Ah, I thought so,” cried Marcotte, delighted to divert his master’s ill-humour from himself, “he has not seen it, he has not seen the animal at all, he does not know what we mean by this wretched buck! But look here, my Lord, see, the marks on these leaves where the animal has bitten; it was just here that the dogs came to a full stop, and now, although the ground is good to show every mark, we can find no trace of the animal, for ten, twenty, or a hundred paces even?”
“You hear?” said the Baron, joining his words on to those of the pricker, “you were up there, and the deer here at your feet. It did not go by like a mouse without making any sound, and you did not see or hear. You must needs have seen or heard it!”
“He has killed the deer,” said Marcotte, “and hidden it away in a bush, that’s as clear as the day.”