I dropped the suitcase for a moment, standing quiet to hear the dogs. Then I smacked fist into palm and laughed, a grim snarling bark of merriment. "Pict!" I said aloud. "Pict, by the gods!" And then, ages after the Picts, the strain had risen again and my comrades and I had fought mankind in our bitter, blind, malignant fashion--to be superstitiously regarded as evil spirits, the undead of the vampire myth. And, come to think of it, we were probably the origin of the grisly werewolf illusion, too. My chest swelled with a strange elated arrogance. This was the reason I hated the humans, calling them _men_ in the accents of loathing. I and my people were not of humanity; we were all those harried, despised and feared creatures in human or nearhuman form, all who had fled down the years and turned at bay and torn the throats from our would-be butchers. Sometimes we must have mated with them, infusing our dark strain into their pale stock. But blood ran in our veins and thoughts coursed in our brains which were as alien to man as the blood and the thoughts of tigers. But it is a proud if lonely thing to be a tiger.... CHAPTER IX The hounds bayed on my trail, and the voice in my head called me forward. I picked up the Gladstone and hastened on, following an invisible path between oozing stretches of swamp under great creeper-festooned oaks, never putting my feet on anything but firm ground. I seemed closer to the earth than I had ever been. It spoke to me, mystically, silently, and I knew where was footing and where was treacherous bog. Even so a fox traverses new territory and never makes a misstep. I don't know how long I walked through the marshland. My thoughts were busy, my heart was light and at the same time full of my hereditary wrath, and always my ears were cocked for the sound of the dogs. At last I realized that they were much closer. I was going fast, but my route must have been deduced and short-cuts taken, on the chance that the dogs could pick up my scent again. I began to run. The rank hanging vegetation brushed my face, bringing a flash of that older hunting scene to mind. Suddenly--and I use that well-worn word in its strongest sense, for never was anything more startlingly sudden--there was a man in the path. I dropped the suitcase and sprang at him, reflexes acting without my conscious volition. My surprise was overwhelming when he avoided my leap with ease, and tripped me before I could turn. Then a number of bodies hit me and pinned me to the mossy earth. With a roar I flung them off, twisting and bounding to my feet. The first man stood near. I feinted and as he dodged I changed the direction of my grasp and caught him by one arm. Then he was above my head, held helpless by my right hand. I faced the others--three of them, there were--and rasped, "One move and he's dead." I wanted the respite of a second or two in which to plan an attack. These were strong and tricky foemen.