Page:The Berkeleys and their neighbors.djvu/78

 polite to each other, and Ahlberg occasionally dined with him at Malvern.

One day he met Ahlberg in the road near the village. Ahlberg had a gun and a full game-bag slung over his shoulder.

"You have had good luck," said Pembroke.

"Very," answered Ahlberg, with his peculiar smile. "I saw nothing to shoot, but I met two blacks, and for a trifle I bought all this. I am not a sportsman like you. I go for a walk—I take my gun. I want a few birds for an entrée. It matters very little where I get them."

"What we call a pot hunter," remarked Pembroke, laughing at what he considered great simplicity on Ahlberg's part. For his own part, his instincts of sport made him consider Ahlberg's method of securing an entrée as but little better than sheep stealing. Ahlberg did not quite take in what manner of sport pot hunting was, nor the contumely visited upon a pot hunter, and so was not offended.

"Will you not come to The Beeches to-morrow evening and dine with us on these birds?" he asked. "This is my party, not Elise's, who is ill with a distressing cold. I have asked the Reverend Cole too, and Hibbs and some others, and we will have a "jollitime" as you Americans and English say."

Pembroke agreed, he scarcely knew why, particularly as he seldom dined at The Beeches, and never before at Ahlberg's invitation.

Next evening therefore with Mr. Cole and Mr.