"Hello!" he said to himself. "That's funny—altogether too funny! I certainly left the gas turned on, ready for the spark," and instinctively he fell back a pace, and then stepped out upon the porch.
"Did I leave the burner like that?" he queried, as he stood peering into the dense shadow before him. "Blessed if I can remember! Somehow, though, it seems queer," and, unbuttoning his military great-coat, he slipped his hand beneath its lapel and drew a cartridge from the canvas belt which hung from his shoulder diagonally down across his chest.
"I'm not sure that this is a very sandy proceeding," he thought, pushing home the cartridge, and with a vicious snap locking behind it the breech-block of his rifle; "but if anybody's in the house I'm going to have an even show with him."
Balancing his piece in his left hand, he again entered the hall, turned on the gas, touched the button, and when the jet of flame flared up, glanced quickly into the empty rooms on either side. All was as he had left it in the morning; and after intently listening for a moment he closed and bolted the hall door, and went upstairs to his own rooms.
Once in the room he called his Den, he took off his great-coat, drew the cartridge from his rifle, and returned it to its place in the long row of leaden-tipped, shining copper cylinders in his ammunition-belt, and tossed the belt upon the lounge. Then he went over to the mantel, picked out from the litter upon it a short, dark briarwood, and proceeded to comfort himself with smoke.
"Humph! that was a pretty weak exhibition," he grunted, stooping over to unlace his shoes. "Come to think of it, when I went out this morning I found that I'd left the light burning all night, and—I remember it now clearly enough—turned off the gas to save the bother of going over to punch the button."
He tossed aside his shoes, put on a pair of easy slippers, and lighted a candle. "May as well see that all's tight," he soliloquized, starting on a tour of the silent house; "here goes for 'grand rounds'! It is lonesome, with the family across the water. Wish they'd come home! Can't say I blame the servants for packing up and leaving; but mother'll be wild when she gets my letter telling that they've gone."
From room to room, trying the fastenings of doors and windows, he went his rounds. All was secure; so, pausing on his way to touch the button extinguishing the hall light, he slowly climbed the stairs again, locked the door of his Den, and with a yawn flung himself into his easy-chair.
For a few minutes he quietly sat thinking; then, taking from his pocket a pencil, he began to jot down upon the back of an old envelope a series of figures—his estimate of the scores likely to be made in the match of the morrow.