Now was the time for all his desperate and summoned calmness.  He shut his lips firm, breathing only by his nose; he gradually pushed his way through the tall, withered grass; and at last, when he was almost side by side with Roderick, he peered forward.  They were startlingly near, those brown and dun beasts with the branching antlers!—­he almost shrank back—­and yet he gazed and gazed with a strange fascination.  The stags, which were not more than fifty or sixty yards off, were quite unconscious of any danger; they were quietly feeding; sometimes one of them would cease and raise his head and look lazily around.  Just at this moment, too, a pale sunlight began to shine over the plateau on which they stood; and a very pretty picture it lit up—­the silver-gray rocks, the wide heath, and those slim and elegant creatures grouped here and there as chance directed.  Every single feature of the scene (as he discovered long thereafter) was burned into Lionel’s brain; yet he was not aware of it at the time; his whole attention, as he imagined, was directed towards keeping himself cool and restrained and ready to obey Roderick’s mute directions.  The rifle was stealthily given to him, and as stealthily pushed through the grass.  With his fore-finger the keeper indicated the stag at which Lionel was to fire; it was rather lighter in color than the others, and was standing a little way apart.  Lionel took time to consider, as he thought; in reality it was to still the quick pulsation of his heart; and as he did so the stag, unfortunately for him, moved, so that, instead of offering him an easy broadside shot, it almost faced him, with its head down.  Still, at any moment it might afford a fairer mark; and so, with the utmost caution, and with his lips still shut tight, he slowly raised himself somewhat, and got the rifle into his hands.  Yes, the stag had again moved; its shoulder was exposed; his eyes inquired of Roderick if now was the time; and the keeper nodded assent.

The awful crisis had arrived; and he seemed to blind himself and deaden himself to all things in this mortal world except the little notch in the rifle, the shining sight, and that fawn-colored object over there.  He took a long breath; he steadied and steadied the slightly trembling barrel until it appeared perfectly motionless; and then—­he fired!

Alas! at the very moment that he pulled the trigger—­when it was too late for him to change his purpose—­the stag threw up its head to flick at its side with its horns, and thus quite altered its position; he knew he ought not to fire—­but it was too late—­too late—­and in the very act of pulling the trigger he felt that he had missed.

Roderick sprang to his feet; for the deer, notwithstanding that they could not have discerned where the danger lay, with one consent bounded forward and made for a rocky defile on the farther side of the plateau.

“Come on, sir!  Come on, sir!” the keeper called to Lionel.  “You’ve hit him.  Come along, sir!”