t counting several tons of swill that ought to
be inside him but aren't. It can't go on." I paused and added darkly,
"That pig shall not return."

"But surely you're not going to have him live with _us_, Henry?"

I controlled myself.

"No, Maria," I said, "I am not. At a late hour to-night we will take
him out into the country and lose him."

"Oh, Henry," she began, "supposing--"

I interrupted gently but firmly.

"My mind," said I, "like BERT COOTE'S, is made up. He is my pig and I
may do what I like with him. There is no law against one losing one's
pig. Besides, he is ruining me."

At 10 P.M. we set out _en famille_. It was July. I remember the date
rather particularly because it was just then that they ceased to
ration bacon altogether. At 10.30 the pig was safely lost. At 11 the
front-door closed upon us. At 11.1 little Willy Perkins, the butcher's
son, arrived with the pig and claimed something for restoring lost
property.

A man with a position to keep up simply can't afford to be caught in
the act of feloniously making away with pigs in war-time; besides
DORA was still alive and she might have something to say; so I had to
pretend how pleased I was, and I gave the scamp half-a-crown.

Now I know Perkins and Son well enough to realise that if the animal
had been worth more than half-a-crown they would have allowed me to
lose my pig free of charge. So I made another resolution. It was
pretty drastic, but in a crisis like this severe measures are often
the best. In short, it was murder I contemplated--nothing less.

I went to work carefully. I let four months slip by to allay any
possible suspicion. I paid my weekly cheque without being asked;
without a murmur I parted daily with my swill; in fact I comported
myself as though the unholy plot maturing in my breast was
nonexistent.

At length the night arrived. I took down my long magazine Lee Enfield
and my cartridge (I am not a Volunteer for nothing) and crept to the
Patriot Pig H.Q.

The once-crowded sty lay dark and still. I entered and switched on my
torch: it shone on the loathsome features that I knew so well. He was
all alone, so there could be no mistake. His head was as large
as ever, but his body seemed scarcely visible. I weighed him; he
registered fourteen pounds.:

I will not harrow you, my reader, with details. Suffice it to say my
nerve was sure, my eye true and my hand steady. I killed that pig with
a single shot and went home to be