“But they was off again before one thing could lead to another, taking bottles of hard liquor they had uncorked.  ’The open road!  The open road!’ they yelled as they went.

“Well, that’s about all.  Some of the wives begun to straggle off home, mostly in tears, and some hung round till later.  I was one of these, not wishing to miss anything of an absorbing character.  Edgar Tomlinson went early, too.  Edgar writes ‘The Lounger in the Lobby’ column for the Recorder, and he’d come out to report the entertainment; but at one o’clock he said it was a case for the sporting editor and he’d try to get him out before the kill.

“At different times one or two of the hunters would straggle back for more drink.  They said the quarry was making a long detour round their left flank, trying his darndest to get to the railroad, but they had hopes.  And they scattered out.  Ever and anon you would hear the long howl of some lone drunkard that had got lost from the pack.

“About sunup they all found themselves at the railroad track about a mile beyond the clubhouse, just at the head of Stender’s grade.  There they was voting to picket the track for a mile each way when along come the four-thirty-two way freight.  It had slowed up some making the grade, and while they watched it what should dart out from a bunch of scrub oak but the active figure of Wilfred Lennox.  He made one of them iron ladders all right and was on top of a car when the train come by, but none of ’em dast jump it because it had picked up speed again.

“They said Wilfred stood up and shook both fists at ’em and called ’em every name he could lay his tongue to—­using language so coarse you’d never think it could have come from a poet’s lips.  They could see his handsome face working violently long after they couldn’t hear him.  Just my luck!  I’m always missing something.

“So they come grouching back to the clubhouse and I took ’em home to breakfast.  When we got down to the table old Judge Ballard says:  ’What might have been an evening of rare enjoyment was converted into a detestable failure by that cur.  I saw from the very beginning that he was determined to spoil our fun.’

“‘The joke is sure on us,’ says Ben Sutton, ’but I bear him no grudge.  In fact, I did him an injustice I knew he wasn’t a poet, but I didn’t believe he was even a hobo till he jumped that freight.’

“Alonzo was out in the hall telephoning Henrietta.  We could hear his cheerful voice:  ’No, Pettikins, no!  It doesn’t ache a bit.  What’s that?  Of course I still do!  You are the only woman that ever meant anything to me.  What?  What’s that?  Oh, I may have errant fancies now and again, like the best of men—­you know yourself how sensitive I am to a certain type of flowerlike beauty—­but it never touches my deeper nature.  Yes, certainly, I shall be right up the very minute good old Ben leaves—­to-morrow or next day.  What’s that?  Now, now!  Don’t do that!  Just the minute he leaves—­G’—­by.’