"I couldn't come afore, sir," Wilson shifted from one foot to the other in an undecided sort of manner. He had little twinkling eyes, and sandy hair brushed over his forehead in a carefully oiled curl. He had yellow teeth, which protruded like a rabbit's, and a weak, receding chin; he was a clever jockey, which is about as much as could be said in his favour.
"I couldn't come afore becos the guv'nor wouldn't let me out of his sight. He's a jolly sharp 'un, is David Isaacson, I give you my word."
"Well, what's your object in coming to see me?" repeated Mostyn rather sharply. He neither liked the man himself, nor did he care for this intercourse with one of the servants of his rival.
Wilson took a few steps forward into the room and seated himself, without being invited to do so, upon the very edge of the most unpretentious-looking chair that he could pick out. "I want a word with you, private like," he said in a hoarse, throaty voice. His eyes rested nervously upon the spirit tantalus in its place on the sideboard. He had, perhaps wittingly, seated himself in close proximity to it.
"I've walked across from the Crathorn Stables," he said pleadingly, "an' I can tell you it's dry work." The Crathorn Stables were those at which Don Quixote had been lodged, and they were distant, as Mostyn knew, a good half-dozen miles in the direction of Newmarket.
"You can help yourself. You'll find a tumbler close beside you, and there's whisky in the stand." The jockey did not await a second invitation, but helped himself largely to the spirit, adding to it a very small quantity of water.
"That's better," he said, as he tossed off the spirit. "Now we can tork."
"I'm waiting," said Mostyn drily.
"Well, it's like this," said the jockey, fixing his little eyes upon Mostyn as though attempting to read his thoughts. "I've had a row with the guv'nor; he's a rotter, that's wot he is!" He paused meaningly.
Mostyn gave him no assistance. "Well?" was all he said.