e ain't no boots--old boots nor any other boots."

"Ain't there, Mark? Oh, there was, there was."

"Bosh! You've been dreaming."

"Have I?" said the girl, after a long stare about the moonlit carpet.
"I thought I saw them." Then, with a quick change: "Wherever have you
been?"

"Oh, only to the races with the guv'nor."

"But you ain't been racing till this time o' night?" cried the girl,
suspiciously.

"Well, not quite. Some on 'em--bookies and jocks--got up a bit o'
dinner."

"I don't believe it. What for?"

"All along o' settling up, and that sort of thing."

"Settling up? What's that--paying up?"

"Yes, my gal."

"I know what that means. Now then, out with it."

"Wait till the morning," said Mark, grinning.

"How much was it? No keeping it back. If you do, it's all off, and
I'll never speak to you again. Now then, let this be a lesson to you.
I will know. How much have you lost?"

"Guess."

"I won't guess. It's too serious a matter."

"So it is, my lass; so it is, and I'll make a clean breast of it,
Jenny."

"Yes, you'd better."

"I've won!" he cried, catching the girl in his arms.

"What! I don't believe it."

"I have, and enough, with what the brewers would advance, to take a nice
little country pub--one we can make into a hotel."

"Ah, well," said Jane, primly, "it ain't no time to be talking about no
hotels nor publics in the middle o' the night like this."

"Why not?"

"Because it ain't proper. Look here; is Mr Trimmer coming home?"

"What, ain't he at home neither?"

"No, nobody's come back but you. What about master? Is he along with
her ladyship?"

"No; he was took bad just afore the race, but Dr Granton give him a
pick-me-up that kep' him going till he'd won the race."

"Her ladyship had give him a talking-to, I suppose?"

Mark grinned, winked, and lifted his elbow in a peculiar way, suggestive
of drinking.

"Oh-h-h!" exclaimed Jane, in a half-whisper. "What a shame!"

"Sh!" whispered the groom. "Not a word. Don't say a word to a soul. I
wouldn't have trusted anyone else with it, Jenny. I believe it was on'y
a glass or two of fizz on the top of a bucketful of excitement because
he was going to ride."

"But there it is, you see, Mark! horses and racing leads to drinking,
and I mean to think twice before I tie myself to anyone who drinks and
gambles. Is master with her ladyship now?"

"No, I tell you; he's badly, and stopping at Simpkins's, with