ame" had made him famous and might have made him
wealthy, but he cared neither for fame nor wealth. For twenty years he
had fought a host of great corporations to establish one single point of
law. His antagonists had vainly tried to bribe him, and as vainly to
bully him. He had been assaulted, his life had been threatened, and
altogether, as he admitted, the game had been lively enough to keep him
interested; but having once won the game he tired of that style of play
altogether. He picked out a small but choice practice which permitted
him to work or be idle pretty much as the fancy took him. These were two
odd chums to meet in a small suburban town, there to lead quiet and
uneventful lives, and yet they were the two most contented men in the
place.

[Illustration]

Halford was getting into his clothes, but really with a speed and
precision which got the job over before his impetuous next-door neighbor
had got one leg of his riding-breeches on. Mrs. Halford sat up in bed
and expressed her feeling to her husband, who had never been known to
express his.

"Oh, Jack," she said, "isn't it awful? Would you ever have thought of
such a thing! They must have been awfully careless! Oh, Jack, you will
find him, won't you? Jack, if such a thing happened to one of our
children I should go wild; I'll never get over it myself if he isn't
found. Oh, you don't know how thankful I am that we didn't lose our
Richard that way! Oh, Jack, dear, isn't it too horrible for anything!"

Jack simply responded, with no trace of emotion in his voice:

"It's the hell!"

And yet in those three words Jack Halford expressed, in his own way,
quite as much as his wife had expressed in hers. More, even, for there
was a grim promise in his tone that comforted her heart.

Mrs. Halford's feelings being expressed and in some measure relieved,
she promptly became practical.

"I'll fill your flask, of course, dear. Brandy, I suppose? And what
shall we women take up to the Gun Club besides blankets and clean
clothes?"

Mrs. Halford's husband always thought before he spoke, and she was not
at all surprised that he filled his tobacco-pouch before he answered.
When he did speak he knew what he had to say.

"First something to put in my pocket for Dirck and me to eat. We can't
fool with coming home to breakfast. Second, tell the girls to send up
milk to the Gun Club, and something for you women to eat."

"Oh, I sha'n't want anything to eat," cried Mr