to think of digging with some cheerfulness if Nancy Lammeter were to be won on those terms; but since he must irrevocably lose her as well as the inheritance, and must break every tie but the one that degraded him and left him without motive for trying to recover his better self, he could imagine no future for himself on the other side of confession but that of “ ’listing for a soldier”—the most desperate step, short of suicide, in the eyes of respectable families. No! he would rather trust to casualties than to his own resolve—rather go on sitting at the feast, and sipping the wine he loved, though with the sword hanging over him, and terror in his heart, than rush away into the cold darkness where there was no pleasure left. The utmost concession to Dunstan about the horse began to seem easy compared with the fulfilment of his own threat. But his pride would not let him recommence the conversation otherwise than by continuing the quarrel. Dunstan was waiting for this, and took his ale in shorter draughts than usual.

“It’s just like you,” Godfrey burst out in a bitter tone, “to talk about my selling Wildfire in that cool way—the last thing I’ve got to call my own, and the best bit of horse-flesh I ever had in my life. And if you’d got a spark of pride in you, you’d be ashamed to see the stables emptied and everybody sneering about it. But it’s my belief you’d sell yourself, if it was only for the pleasure of making somebody feel he’d got a bad bargain.”

“Ay, ay,” said Dunstan, very placably, “you do me justice, I see. You know I’m a jewel for ’ticing people into bargains. For which reason I advise you to let me sell Wildfire. I’d ride him to the hunt to-morrow for you with pleasure. I shouldn’t look so handsome as you in the saddle, but it’s the horse they’ll bid for and not the rider.”

“Yes, I dare say—trust my horse to you!”

“As you please,” said Dunstan, rapping the windowseat again with an air of great unconcern. “It’s you have got to pay Fowler’s money; it’s none of my business. You received the money from him when you went to Bramcote, and you told the Squire it wasn’t paid. I’d nothing to do with that; you chose to be so obliging as to give it me, that was all. If you don’t want to pay the money, let it alone; it’s all one to me. But I was willing to accommodate you by undertaking to sell the horse, seeing it’s not convenient to you to go so far to-morrow.”

Godfrey was silent for some moments. He would have liked to spring on Dunstan, wrench the whip from his hand, and flog him to within an inch of his life, and no bodily fear could have deterred him; but he was mastered by another sort of fear, which was fed by feelings stronger even than his resentment. When he spoke again it was in a half-conciliatory tone.

“Well, you mean no nonsense about the horse, eh? You’ll sell him all fair, and hand over the money? If you don’t, you know, everything ’ull go to smash, for I’ve got nothing else to trust to. And you’ll have less pleasure in pulling the horse over my head when your own skull’s to be broken too.”

“Ay, ay,” said Dunstan, rising; “all right. I thought you’d come round. I’m the fellow to bring old Bryce up to the scratch. I’ll get you a hundred and twenty for him, if I get you a penny.”

“But it’ll perhaps rain cats and dogs to-morrow, as it did yesterday, and then you can’t go,” said Godfrey, hardly knowing whether he wished for that obstacle or not.

“Not it,” said Dunstan; “I’m always lucky in my weather. It might rain if you wanted to go yourself. You never hold trumps, you know; I always do. You’ve got the beauty, you see, and I’ve got the luck, so you must keep me by you for your crooked sixpence; you’ll ne-ver get along without me.”

“Confound you, hold your tongue!” said Godfrey impetuously. “And take care to keep sober to-morrow, else you’ll get pitched on your head coming home, and Wildfire might be the worse for it.”

“Make your tender heart easy,” said Dunstan, opening the door. “You never knew me see double when I’d got a bargain to make; it ’ud spoil the fun. Besides, whenever I fall, I’m warranted to fall on my legs.”