As she spoke Aubrey caught her, swung her back to a sound of furious hissing, and Boodles saw a viper upon a patch of bleached grass, head erect, swaying to and fro, and exceedingly angry at being disturbed. It was a beautiful, as well as a malevolent, creature. Its black zig-zag markings were vivid in the sunlight, and its open mouth was as red as a poppy-leaf. "You were just going to tread upon it," cried the boy. "The poor dog!" lamented Boodles, all her sympathies naturally with the suffering animal. Then she had to be sorry for the reptile, for Aubrey declared it must die, not so much because it had bitten the dog, as because it might have bitten her ankle, and he went and destroyed it with his stick. By that time Boodles was wretched. She felt that most of the pleasure had gone out of their walk. They had been so happy, in a serene atmosphere, and then the weather had changed, as it were, and the cruelty and malevolence of Nature had come along to remind them they had no business to be so happy, and that the place was not an ideal fairyland after all. There was an atmosphere of suffering all around, though they could not always see it, and cruelty in every living thing. Even the sun was cruel, for it was beginning to make the radiant head ache. They went after the dog, and found him much distressed, because he had been bitten in the neck, and swelling had commenced. Living upon Dartmoor, Boodles knew all about viper-bites, and she ordered Aubrey to take the dog back and attend to the wound at once. Then she had to gulp down a lump in her throat and rub her eyes. The weather had changed badly, and things had gone quite wrong. When they had walked in the wood as little children nothing unpleasant had ever happened, or at least they had never noticed anything disagreeable. Now they were grown up, as she thought, all sorts of troubles came to spoil their ramble. The dog had tortured the rabbit; the viper had bitten the dog; Aubrey had killed the viper. The tale of suffering seemed to be running up the scale towards herself. Was there any creature, stronger than themselves, who could be so brutal as to take pleasure in biting or torturing such harmless beings as Aubrey and herself? CHAPTER IX ABOUT A KNAVE AND A FOOL