"
"Not since early this morning, and 'tis now midnight! Where can he be?"
"The Lord knows, sir! after no good I doubt, for he's a wild lad, and
these fairs and dances, fairly turn his brain."
Little further passed that night between the young lord and his
housekeeper; after taking some refreshment he retired to rest, and poor
Annette also sought, under the auspices of circumspect Mistress Margery,
repose in Castle Mortimer, little anticipating the singularly dreadful
disclosure of the ensuing morning. Charles, in fact, not having
returned, one of the inferior serving-men,--who durst not, now that his
master was at home, stand upon the punctilio of "_not my business_,"
undertook soon after dawn to "see to the hounds," in his stead; when
upon opening the door of the large enclosure in which they were kept, he
there beheld, to his unutterable consternation and horror, _the mangled
remnants of the careless and cruel Huntsman_: these consisted of his
clothes, torn into strips, and dyed in blood, with fragments sufficient
of flesh and bone to attest the hideous fact, that the ravenous brutes,
had, after their last long fast, sprung upon their tormentor, (awful
retribution!) even at the very moment when he appeared amongst them with
their long delayed meal, torn him in pieces, and devoured him!
Lord Mortimer, though, he could not in conscience blame his canine
favourites, nor forbear regarding his huntsman's fate as a signal
instance of the retributive justice of Providence, felt himself obliged
to destroy the whole pack, after their ferocious banquet on human flesh;
and with tears in his eyes, he forced himself to witness their
execution, lest the cupidity or misjudging kindness of any of his
retainers, should induce them to mitigate the culprits' doom.
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