The Wolves of God - The Original Classic Edition. Wilson Algernon

that might be difficult to drag out of him. It was.

       Ericssen, who had leaned forward a moment so that[75] his strong, humorous face was in clear light, now sank back again into his chair, his expression concealed by the red lampshade at his side. The light played tricks, obliterating the humorous, almost tender lines, while emphasizing the strength of the jaw and nose. The red glare lent to the whole a rather grim expression.

       Lawson, man of authority among them, broke the little pause.

       "You're dead right," he observed, "but how do you know it?"--for John Ericssen never made a positive statement without a good reason for it. That good reason, he felt sure, involved a personal proof, but a story Ericssen would never tell before a general audi-ence. He would tell it later, however, when the others had left. "There's such a thing as instinctive antipathy, of course," he added, with a laugh, looking around him. "That's what you mean probably."

       "I meant exactly what I said," replied the host bluntly. "There's first love. There's first hate, too."

       "Hate's a strong word," remarked Lawson. "So is love," put in another.

       "Hate's strongest," said Ericssen grimly. "In the animal kingdom, at least," he added suggestively, and then kept his lips closed, except to sip his liquor, for the rest of the evening--until the party at length broke up, leaving Lawson and one other man, both old trusted friends of many years' standing.

       "It's not a tale I'd tell to everybody," he began, when they were alone. "It's true, for one thing; for another, you see, some of those good fellows"--he indicated the empty chairs with an expressive nod of his great head--"some of 'em knew him. You both knew him too, probably."

       "The man you hated," said the understanding Lawson.

       "And who hated me," came the quiet confirmation. "My other reason," he went on, "for keeping quiet was that the tale involves my

       wife."[76]

       The two listeners said nothing, but each remembered the curiously long courtship that had been the prelude to his marriage. No engagement had been announced, the pair were devoted to one another, there was no known rival on either side; yet the courtship continued without coming to its expected conclusion. Many stories were afloat in consequence. It was a social mystery that intrigued the gossips.

       "I may tell you two," Ericssen continued, "the reason my wife refused for so long to marry me. It is hard to believe, perhaps, but it is true. Another man wished to make her his wife, and she would not consent to marry me until that other man was dead. Quixotic, absurd, unreasonable? If you like. I'll tell you what she said." He looked up with a significant expression in his face which proved

       that he, at least, did not now judge her reason foolish. "'Because it would be murder,' she told me. 'Another man who wants to marry me would kill you.'"

       "She had some proof for the assertion, no doubt?" suggested Lawson.

       "None whatever," was the reply. "Merely her woman's instinct. Moreover, I did not know who the other man was, nor would she ever tell me."

       "Otherwise you might have murdered him instead?" said Baynes, the second listener.

       "I did," said Ericssen grimly. "But without knowing he was the man." He sipped his whisky and relit his pipe. The others waited. "Our marriage took place two months later--just after Hazel's disappearance."

       "Hazel?" exclaimed Lawson and Baynes in a single breath. "Hazel! Member of the Hunters!" His mysterious disappearance had been

       a nine days' wonder some ten years ago. It had never been explained. They had all been members of the Hunters' Club together.

       "That's the chap," Ericssen said. "Now I'll tell you[77] the tale, if you care to hear it." They settled back in their chairs to listen, and

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       Ericssen, who had evidently never told the affair to another living soul except his own wife, doubtless, seemed glad this time to tell it to two men.

       "It began some dozen years ago when my brother Jack and I came home from a shooting trip in China. I've often told you about our adventures there, and you see the heads hanging up here in the smoking-room--some of 'em." He glanced round proudly at

       the walls. "We were glad to be in town again after two years' roughing it, and we looked forward to our first good dinner at the club, to make up for the rotten cooking we had endured so long. We had ordered that dinner in anticipatory detail many a time together. Well, we had it and enjoyed it up to a point--the point of the entree, to be exact.