eard for many a year. What a scoundrel
that fellow was! I 've good ground for believing that this Davis it was
poisoned Sir Aubrey, the best horse I ever owned. Three men of his stamp
would make racing a sport unfit for gentlemen."

"Miss Kellett, will you allow me?" said Beecher, offering his arm,
and right well pleased that the announcement of dinner cut short the
conversation.

"A nice fellow that friend of your brother's," muttered he, as he led
her along; "but what a stupid thing to go and serve in the ranks! It's
about the last step I 'd ever have thought of taking."

"I'm certain of it," said Bella, with an assent so ready as to sound
like flattery.

As the dinner proceeded, old Kellett's astonishment continued to
increase at the deference paid by Beecher to every remark that fell from
Conway. The man who had twice won "the Bexley," and all but won "the
Elms;" he who owned Sir Aubrey, and actually took the odds against all
"Holt's stable," was no common celebrity. In vain was it Conway tried to
lead the conversation to his friend Jack,--what they had seen, and where
they had been together,--Beecher would bring them back to the Turf and
the "Racing Calendar." There were so many dark things he wanted to know,
so much of secret history he hoped to be enlightened in; and whenever,
as was often the case, Conway did not and could not give him the desired
information, Beecher slyly intimated by a look towards Kellett that he
was a deep fellow; while he muttered to himself, "Grog Davis would have
it out of him, notwithstanding all his cunning."

Bella alone wished to hear about the war. It was not alone that her
interest was excited for her brother, but in the great events of
that great struggle her enthusiastic spirit found ample material for
admiration. Conway related many heroic achievements, not alone of
British soldiers, but of French and even Russians. Gallantry, as
he said, was of no nation in particular,--there were brave fellows
everywhere; and he told, with all the warmth of honest admiration, how
daringly the enemy dashed into the lines at night and confronted certain
death, just for the sake of causing an interruption to the siege, and
delaying, even for a brief space, the advance of the works. Told, as
these stories were, with all the freshness which actual observation
confers, and in a spirit of unexaggerated simplicity, still old Kellett
heard them with the peevish jealousy of one who felt that they w