Despite some 30 seasons passing, I remember the day with crystal clarity. Hounds met at Lowesby, the grassy heart of the Quorn Friday country. The bitch pack looked their usual lithe selves; Richard Mould, the grand old pack’s kennel-huntsman, did likewise.
I sidled up to my friend, who was mounted on a butty horse, his eyes forever on his hounds. “All well?” I asked. “Morning Arthur,” he replied — you tend to get called Arthur by people of a certain vintage if your surname is Negus — “I hope this horse of yours jumps,” he muttered out of the side of his mouth, patting the bay mare’s neck. I had sold the horse to the hunt in the autumn.
