"It\'s that nasty, beastly, drunken club," said Mrs. Masters to her unfortunate husband on the Wednesday morning. It may perhaps be remembered that the poisoned fox was found on the Saturday, and it may be imagined that Mr. Goarly had risen in importance since that day. On the Saturday Bean with a couple of men employed by Lord Rufford, had searched the wood, and found four or five red herrings poisoned with strychnine. There had been no doubt about the magnitude of the offence. On the Monday a detective policeman, dressed of course in rustic disguise but not the less known to every one in the place, was wandering about between Dillsborough and Dillsborough Wood and making futile inquiries as to the purchase of strychnine,—and also as to the purchase of red herrings. But every one knew, and such leading people as Runciman and Dr. Nupper were not slow to declare, that Dillsborough was the only place in England in which one might be sure that those articles had not been purchased. And on the Tuesday it began to be understood that Goarly had applied to Bearside, the other attorney, in reference to his claim against Lord Rufford\'s pheasants. He had contemptuously refused the 7s. 6d. an acre offered him, and put his demand at 40s. As to the poisoned fox and the herrings and the strychnine Goarly declared that he didn\'t care if there were twenty detectives in the place. He stated it to be his opinion that Larry Twentyman had put down the poison. It was all very well, Goarly said, for Larry to be fond of gentlemen and to ride to hounds, and make pretences;—but Larry liked his turkeys as well as anybody else, and Larry had put down the poison. In this matter Goarly overreached himself. No one in Dillsborough could be brought to believe that. Even Harry Stubbings was ready to swear that he should suspect himself as soon. But nothing was clearer than this,—that Goarly was going to make a stand against the hunt and especially against Lord Rufford. He had gone to Bearside and Bearside had taken up the matter in a serious way. Then it became known very quickly that Bearside had already received money, and it was surmised that Goarly had some one at his back. Lord Rufford had lately ejected from a house of his on the other side of the county a discontented litigious retired grocer from Rufford, who had made some money and had set himself up in a pretty little residence with a few acres of land. The man had made himself objectionable and had been dispossessed. The man\'s name was Scrobby; and hence had come these sorrows. This was the story that had already made itself known in Dillsborough on the Tuesday evening. But up to that time not a tittle of evidence had come to light as to the purchase of the red herrings or the strychnine. All that was known was the fact that had not Tony Tuppett stopped the hounds before they reached the wood, there must have been a terrible mortality. "It\'s that nasty, beastly, drunken club," said Mrs. Masters to her husband. Of course it was at this time known to the lady that her husband had thrown away Goarly\'s business and that it had been transferred to Bearside. It was also surmised by her, as it was by the town in general, that Goarly\'s business would come to considerable dimensions;—just the sort of case as would have been sure to bring popularity if carried through, as Nickem, the senior clerk, would have carried it. And as soon as Scrobby\'s name was heard by Mrs. Masters, there was no end to the money in the lady\'s imagination to which this very case might not have amounted.

"The club had nothing to do with it, my dear."

"What time did you come home on Saturday night;—or Sunday morning I mean? Do you mean to tell me you didn\'t settle it there?"

"There was no nastiness, and no beastliness, and no drunkenness about it. I told you before I went that I wouldn\'t take it."

"No;—you didn\'t. How on earth are you to go on if you chuck the children\'s bread out of their mouths in that way?"

"You won\'t believe me. Do you ask Twentyman what sort of a man Goarly is." The attorney knew that Larry was in great favour with his wife as being the favoured suitor for Mary\'s hand, and had thought that this argument would be very strong.

"I don\'t want Mr. Twentyman to teach me what is proper for my family,—nor yet to teach you your business. Mr. Twentyman has his own way of living. He brought home Kate the other day with hardly a rag of her sister\'s habit left. She don\'t go out hunting any more."

"Very well, my dear."

"Indeed for the matter of that I don\'t see how any of them are to do anything. What\'ll Lord Rufford do for you?"

"I don\'t want Lord Rufford to do anything for me." The attorney was beginning to have his spirit stirred within him.

"You don\'t want anybody to do anything, and yet you will do nothing yourself,—just because a set of drinking fellows in a tap-room, which you call a club—"

"It isn\'t a tap-room."

"It\'s worse, because nobody can see what you\'re doing. I know how it was. You hadn\'t the pluck to hold to your own when Runciman told you not." There was a spice of truth in this which made it all the more bitter. "Runciman knows on which side his bread is buttered. He can make his money out of these swearing-tearing fellows. He can send in his bills, and get them paid too. And it\'s all very well for Larry Twentyman to be hobbing and nobbing with the likes of them Botseys. But for a father of a family like you to be put off his business by what Mr. Runciman says is a shame."

"I shall manage my business as I think fit," said the attorney.

"And when we\'re all in the poor-house what\'ll you do then?" said Mrs. Masters,—with her handkerchief out at the spur of the moment. Whenever she roused her husband to a state of bellicose ire by her taunts she could always reduce him again by her tears. Being well aware of this he would bear the taunts as long as he could, knowing that the tears would be still worse. He was so soft-hearted that when she affected to be miserable, he could not maintain the sternness of his demeanour and leave her in her misery. "When everything has gone away from us, what are we to do? My little bit of money has disappeared ever so long." Then she sat herself down in her chair and had a great cry. It was useless for him to remind her that hitherto she had never wanted anything for herself or her children. She was resolved that everything was going to the dogs because Goarly\'s case had been refused. "And what will all those sporting men do for you?" she repeated. "I hate the very name of a gentleman;—so I do. I wish Goarly had killed all the foxes in the county. Nasty vermin! What good are the likes of them?"

Nickem, the senior clerk, was at first made almost as unhappy as Mrs. Masters by the weak decision to which his employer had come, and had in the first flush of his anger resolved to leave the office. He was sure that the case was one which would just have suited him. He would have got up the evidence as to the fertility of the land, the enormous promise of crop, and the ultimate absolute barrenness, to a marvel. He would have proved clouds of pheasants. And then Goarly\'s humble position, futile industry, and general poverty might have been contrasted beautifully with Lord Rufford\'s wealth, idleness, and devotion to sport. Anything above the 7s. 6d. an acre obta............