"'Tis pretty sport," said Dick, "but it leaves traces."
Between us the thin red soil of the ridge was heaped in mounds, and
its stain streaked our clothes and faces. On one of these mounds lay
a spade and two picks, a pair of tongs, an old sack, dyed in its
original service of holding sheep's reddle, and, on the sack, the
carcase of our badger, its grey hairs messed with blood about the
snout. This carcase was a matter of study not only to me, who had my
sketch-book out, but to a couple of Dick's terriers tied up to a
sapling close by--an ugly mongrel, half fox-half bull-terrier, and a
Dandie Dinmont--who were straining to get at it. As for Dick, he
never lifted his eyes, but went on handling Meg.
He had the gypsy's secret with animals, and the poor little bitch
hardly winced under his touch, though her under-lip was torn away,
and hung, like a red rag, by half an inch of flesh.
We had dug and listened and dug again for our badger, all the
morning. Then Dick sent his mongrel in at the hole, and the mongrel
had come forth like a projectile and sat down at a distance,
bewailing his lot. After him the Dandie went in and sneaked out
again with a fore-paw bitten to the bone. And at last Meg stepped in
grimly, and stayed. For a time there was dead silence, and then as
we pressed our ears against the turf and the violets, that were just
beginning their autumnal flowering, we heard a scuffling underground
and began to dig down to it, till the sweat streamed into our eyes.
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