What would you? It was past endurance. By the blood of Judas, how I hated him! Then there was that name--Claverhouse! What a name! Wasn’t it absurd? Claverhouse! Merciful heaven, _why_ Claverhouse? Again and again I asked myself that question. I should not have minded Smith, or Brown, or Jones--but _Claverhouse_! I leave it to you. Repeat it to yourself--Claverhouse. Just listen to the ridiculous sound of it--Claverhouse! Should a man live with such a name? I ask of you. “No,” you say. And “No” said I. But I bethought me of his mortgage. What of his crops and barn destroyed, I knew he would be unable to meet it. So I got a shrewd, close-mouthed, tight-fisted money-lender to get the mortgage transferred to him. I did not appear, but through this agent I forced the foreclosure, and but few days (no more, believe me, than the law allowed) were given John Claverhouse to remove his goods and chattels from the premises. Then I strolled down to see how he took it, for he had lived there upward of twenty years. But he met me with his saucer-eyes twinkling, and the light glowing and spreading in his face till it was as a full-risen moon. “Ha! ha! ha!” he laughed. “The funniest tike, that youngster of mine! Did you ever hear the like? Let me tell you. He was down playing by the edge of the river when a piece of the bank caved in and splashed him. ‘Oh, papa!’ he cried; ‘a great big puddle flewed up and hit me.’” He stopped and waited for me to join him in his infernal glee. “I don’t see any laugh in it,” I said, shortly, and I know my face went sour. He regarded me with wonderment, and then came the damnable light, glowing and spreading, as I have described it, till his face shone soft and warm, like the summer moon, and then the laugh--“Ha! ha! That’s funny! You don’t see it, eh? He! he! Ho! ho! ho! He doesn’t see it! Why, look here. You know, a puddle----” But I turned on my heel and left him. That was the last. I could stand it no longer. The thing must end right there, I thought, curse him! The earth should be quit of him. And as I went over the hill, I could hear his monstrous laugh reverberating against the sky. Now, I pride myself on doing things neatly, and when I resolved to kill John Claverhouse I had it in mind to do so in such a fashion that I should not look back upon it and feel ashamed. I hate bungling, and I hate brutality. To me there is something repugnant in merely striking a man with one’s naked fist--faugh! it is sickening! So, to shoot, or stab, or club John Claverhouse (O that name!) did not appeal to me. And not only was I impelled to do it neatly and artistically, but also in such manner that not the slightest possible suspicion could be directed against me.