“Don’t you think your language is a trifle—­er—­overstrong, Wynne?” he said, in that quiet voice of his which made all men listen and wonder why they did it.

Wynne tossed his shoulders.  His thick neck was rather red.

“No, I’m damned if I do!  You’re men here—­or supposed to be—­not a pack of weak-kneed women!...  Afraid to go out and see what those lights are, are you?  Well, I’m not.  Look here.  I’ll have a bet with you boys.  Fifty pounds that I get back safely, and dispel the morbid fancies from your kindergarten brains by tellin’ you that the things are glow-worms, or some fool out for a practical joke on the neighbourhood—­which has fallen for it like this sort of one-horse hole-in-the-corner place would!  Fifty pounds?  What say you?”

He glowered round upon each of them in turn, his sneering lips showing the pointed dogs’ teeth behind them, his whole arrogant personality brutally awake.  “Who’ll take it on?  You Merriton?  Fifty pounds, man, that I don’t get back safely and report to you chaps at twelve o’clock to-night.”

Merriton’s flushed face went a shade or two redder, and he took an involuntary step forward.  It was only the doctor’s fingers upon his coat-sleeve that restrained him.  Then, too, he felt some anxiety that this drunken fool should attempt to do the very thing which another drunken fool had attempted three months back.  He couldn’t bet on another man’s chance of life, like he would on a race-horse!

“You’ll be a fool if you go, Wynne,” he said, as quietly as his excitement would permit.  “As my guest I ask you not to.  The thing may be all rubbish—­possibly is—­but I’d rather you took no chances.  Who it is that hides out there and kills his victims or smuggles them away I don’t know, but I’d rather you didn’t, old chap.  And I’m not betting on a fellow’s life.  Have another drink man, and forget all about it.”

Wynne took this creditable effort at reconciliation with a harsh guffaw.  He crossed to Nigel and put his big, heavy hands upon the slim shoulders, bending his flushed face down so that the eyes of both were almost upon a level.

“You little, white-livered sneak,” he said in a deep rumbling voice that was like thunder in the still room.  “Pull yourself together and try to be a man.  Take on the bet or not, whichever you like.  You’re savin’ up for the housekeepin’ I suppose.  Well, take it or leave it—­fifty pounds that I get back safe in this house to-night.  Are you on?”

Merriton’s teeth bit into his lips until the blood came in the effort at repression.  He shook Wynne’s hands off his shoulders and laughed straight into the other man’s sneering face.

“Well then go—­and be damned to you!” he said fiercely.  “And blame your drunken wits if you come to grief.  I’ve done my best to dissuade you.  If you were less drunk I’d square the thing up and fight you.  But I’m on, all right.  Fifty pounds that you don’t get back here—­though I’m decent enough to hope I’ll have to pay it.  That satisfy you?”