Gudrun and Winifred went through the house to the back, where were the stables and the out-buildings.Everywhere was still and deserted.Mr Crich had gone out for a short drive, the stableman had just led round Gerald's horse.The two girls went to the hutch that stood in a corner, and looked at the great black-and-white rabbit.
`Isn't he beautiful! Oh, do look at him listening! Doesn't he look silly!'
she laughed quickly, then added `Oh, do let's do him listening, do let us, he listens with so much of himself;--don't you darling Bismarck?'
`Can we take him out?' said Gudrun.
`He's very strong.He really is extremely strong.' She looked at Gudrun, her head on one side, in odd calculating mistrust.
`But we'll try, shall we?'
`Yes, if you like.But he's a fearful kicker!'
They took the key to unlock the door.The rabbit exploded in a wild rush round the hutch.
`He scratches most awfully sometimes,' cried Winifred in excitement.
`Oh do look at him, isn't he wonderful!' The rabbit tore round the hutch in a hurry.`Bismarck!' cried the child, in rousing excitement.`How dreadful you are! You are beastly.' Winifred looked up at Gudrun with some misgiving in her wild excitement.Gudrun smiled sardonically with her mouth.Winifred made a strange crooning noise of unaccountable excitement.`Now he's still!'
she cried, seeing the rabbit settled down in a far corner of the hutch.
`Shall we take him now?' she whispered excitedly, mysteriously, looking up at Gudrun and edging very close.`Shall we get him now?--' she chuckled wickedly to herself.
They unlocked the door of the hutch.Gudrun thrust in her arm and seized the great, lusty rabbit as it crouched still, she grasped its long ears.
It set its four feet flat, and thrust back.There was a long scraping sound as it was hauled forward, and in another instant it was in mid-air, lunging wildly, its body flying like a spring coiled and released, as it lashed out, suspended from the ears.Gudrun held the black-and-white tempest at arms' length, averting her face.But the rabbit was magically strong, it was all she could do to keep her grasp.She almost lost her presence of mind.
`Bismarck, Bismarck, you are behaving terribly,' said Winifred in a rather frightened voice, `Oh, do put him down, he's beastly.'
Gudrun stood for a moment astounded by the thunder-storm that had sprung into being in her grip.Then her colour came up, a heavy rage came over her like a cloud.She stood shaken as a house in a storm, and utterly overcome.
Her heart was arrested with fury at the mindlessness and the bestial stupidity of this struggle, her wrists were badly scored by the claws of the beast, a heavy cruelty welled up in her.
Gerald came round as she was trying to capture the flying rabbit under her arm.He saw, with subtle recognition, her sullen passion of cruelty.
`You should let one of the men do that for you,' he said hurrying up.
`Oh, he's so horrid!' cried Winifred, almost frantic.
He held out his nervous, sinewy hand and took the rabbit by the ears, from Gudrun.
`It's most fearfully strong,' she cried, in a high voice, like the crying a seagull, strange and vindictive.
The rabbit made itself into a ball in the air, and lashed out, flinging itself into a bow.It really seemed demoniacal.Gudrun saw Gerald's body tighten, saw a sharp blindness come into his eyes.
`I know these beggars of old,' he said.
The long, demon-like beast lashed out again, spread on the air as if it were flying, looking something like a dragon, then closing up again, inconceivably powerful and explosive.The man's body, strung to its efforts, vibrated strongly.Then a sudden sharp, white-edged wrath came up in him.
Swift as lightning he drew back and brought his free hand down like a hawk on the neck of the rabbit.Simultaneously, there came the unearthly abhorrent scream of a rabbit in the fear of death.It made one immense writhe, tore his wrists and his sleeves in a final convulsion, all its belly flashed white in a whirlwind of paws, and then he had slung it round and had it under his arm, fast.It cowered and skulked.His face was gleaming with a smile.
`You wouldn't think there was all that force in a rabbit,' he said, looking at Gudrun.And he saw her eyes black as night in her pallid face, she looked almost unearthly.The scream of the rabbit, after the violent tussle, seemed to have torn the veil of her consciousness.He looked at her, and the whitish, electric gleam in his face intensified.
`I don't really like him,' Winifred was crooning.`I don't care for him as I do for Loozie.He's hateful really.'
A smile twisted Gudrun's face, as she recovered.She knew she was revealed.