As Tony got near to the gorse and also near to the road he managed with infinite skill to get the hounds off the scent, and to make a fictitious cast to the left as though he thought the fox had traversed that way.

Tony knew well enough that the fox was at that moment in Littleton Gorse;--but he knew also that the gorse was only six acres, that such a fox as he had before him wouldn't stay there two minutes after the first hound was in it, and that Dillsborough Wood,--which to his imagination was full of poison,--would then be only a mile and a half before him.
Tony, whose fault was a tendency to mystery,--as is the fault of most huntsmen,--having accomplished his object in stopping the hounds, pretended to cast about with great diligence.

He crossed the road and was down one side of a field and along another, looking anxiously for the Captain.

"The fox has gone on to the gorse," said the elder Botsey; "what a stupid old pig he is;"-- meaning that Tony Tuppett was the pig.
"He was seen going on," said Larry, who had come across a man mending a drain.
"It would be his run of course," said Hampton, who was generally up to Tony's wiles, but who was now as much in the dark as others.
Then four or five rode up to the huntsman and told him that the fox had been seen heading for the gorse.

Tony said not a word but bit his lips and scratched his head and bethought himself what fools men might be even though they did ride well to hounds.