“Are you going to stop us?” I said.

“Of course I am,” said he.

“Let me put her down, and we’ll have a fair fight.”

He shook his head.

“All very well for young men,” he said. “At my age, if a man holds trumps he keeps them.”

“How long have you been here?”

“About two minutes. When I didn’t see you at the bank I thought something was up, so I galloped on to her house. No one there! So I came on here. A good shot, eh?”

The fall had done it. But for that we should have been safe.

“Well?” he said.

In the bitterness of my heart I could hardly speak. But I was not going to play either the cur or the fool, so I said: