“Go in, Tom,” urged Murray, and the man made a step toward the door, when a voice demanded:
“Tom! Tom Atwood! is that you, and is this the way you come down to the club for rest?”
Tom Atwood’s hair almost stood on end. He recoiled and glared, and Murray called out:
“Hello! That’s the voice of a ghost from New York. You lose the bets, Tom. You’re working a fraud on us. You didn’t mean to sleep alone in that house, you rascal.”
The other men called out:
“Well, this is a nice scheme, old man. You didn’t tell us Mrs. Atwood was coming down.”
Tom made no answer, but just stood, not like one gazing upon an apparition, but like a man confronted by a more frightful reality, and we will explain.
Tom Atwood was at home a professed temperance man, and when he went down to the club he generally made up for his total abstinence during his sojourn at home. His wife, as was well known, was a hater of strong drink, and Tom pretended to strictly conform to her prejudices, and he stood there paralyzed, believing his wife had suspected him and had paid a secret visit to the club to find him out. Indeed, instead of playing a fraud on his fellow members he suspected they were putting up a little job on him, and that they were all aware of the presence of his wife in the house, and after he thought he knew why they had all been so liberal in “setting ’em up” until he got full as a tick.
“Go in, Tom,” said Murray.
When the detective spoke to him the man decided that he could solve the mystery. He could not only account for the presence of his wife, but the presence of the detective down at the club was accounted for, and with an oath he said: