at he went through for her
sake; "and as to Hercules and Theseus, they were nothing to me. They
had sport, and never learned to write a bookkeeping hand." And now,
Mary being out of the way for a little while, Fred, like any other
strong dog who cannot slip his collar, had pulled up the staple of his
chain and made a small escape, not of course meaning to go fast or far.
There could be no reason why he should not play at billiards, but he
was determined not to bet. As to money just now, Fred had in his mind
the heroic project of saving almost all of the eighty pounds that Mr.
Garth offered him, and returning it, which he could easily do by giving
up all futile money-spending, since he had a superfluous stock of
clothes, and no expense in his board. In that way he could, in one
year, go a good way towards repaying the ninety pounds of which he had
deprived Mrs. Garth, unhappily at a time when she needed that sum more
than she did now. Nevertheless, it must be acknowledged that on this
evening, which was the fifth of his recent visits to the billiard-room,
Fred had, not in his pocket, but in his mind, the ten pounds which he
meant to reserve for himself from his half-year's salary (having before
him the pleasure of carrying thirty to Mrs. Garth when Mary was likely
to be come home again)--he had those ten pounds in his mind as a fund
from which he might risk something, if there were a chance of a good
bet. Why? Well, when sovereigns were flying about, why shouldn't he
catch a few? He would never go far along that road again; but a man
likes to assure himself, and men of pleasure generally, what he could
do in the way of mischief if he chose, and that if he abstains from
making himself ill, or beggaring himself, or talking with the utmost
looseness which the narrow limits of human capacity will allow, it is
not because he is a spooney. Fred did not enter into formal reasons,
which are a very artificial, inexact way of representing the tingling
returns of old habit, and the caprices of young blood: but there was
lurking in him a prophetic sense that evening, that when he began to
play he should also begin to bet--that he should enjoy some
punch-drinking, and in general prepare himself for feeling "rather
seedy" in the morning. It is in such indefinable movements that action
often begins.

But the last thing likely to have entered Fred's expectation was that
he should see his brother-in-law Lydgate--of whom he had n