THE Coffee-room of the Blue Boar wore a remarkably cheerful aspect on the evening of the day on which we have seen something of Beau Ripple's methods. There had been a splendid run from Oaktree Common across the downs to Deadman's Coppice, where a short check only lent a spice to that glorious final run across Baverstock Ridge until they killed just outside Farmer Hogbin's famous barn. And after the death what delicious musick acclaimed the deed—the baying of hounds, the chatter of maids, the clatter of horses' hoofs, the guffaws of Lieutenant Blewforth, the still louder guffaws of Farmer Hogbin mounted on his raw-boned hunter of sixteen hands, the blasts of the horns, the chink of glasses and the wind getting up in the South-west, all combined in harmonious delight. What a splendid ride home it was and how the riders went over each renowned minute of that for-ever-to-be-famous day. Lieutenant Blewforth swore he would forsake the sea for the life of a country gentleman, and everybody laughed when H.M.S. Centaur (so they had named Blewforth and his steed) shied at a belated calf.
"Egad! B-b-Blewforth," stammered little Peter Wingfield, "'tis lucky your stomach was trained on the roaring d-d-deep, for you pitch and roll like a sloop making Ushant."
"Ah! my boy," shouted Blewforth, "my pretty sloop don't shy like this d——d bum-boat I'm pulling."
How Mr. Golightly of Campbell's Grey Dragoons swore such a run was better than a frontal charge at the enemy's guns and how young Tom Chalkley of the Foot stiffened all over and muttered something about the Cavalry. Indeed the only person to look glum was Mr. Anthony Clare who, though he rode better than any of them and had shown them his horse's heels all the way, missed Charles Lovely.
As they walked along the road, fading into early dusk, and heard the wind sighing in the trim hedges and saw the lights of Curtain Wells seven miles away, Clare cursed that passion for cards which made a man forsake the bleak Spring fallows for pastures of green baize.
But later when the huge cold sirloin that sailed in so sleek, sailed out like a battered wreck, and when pints of generous Burgundy had coloured life to its own rich hue, and when Mr. Daish himself had coaxed the fire to roar and blaze up the chimney, and set out the walnuts and put half a dozen ample chairs round the fire, Mr. Clare could not resist the universal content, but must laugh and make merry and relate the events of the day for the seventh time, with as much zest as any of the returned heroes.
Charles had surely been winning: he was so flushed and talked so loudly. Actually he did not possess a penny, and what was worse, owed Mr. Vernon a couple of hundred guineas. Not much, but enough when you have only cloaths to sell, and not a prospect in the world.
Presently one by one the hunters dropped off to sleep with legs outstretched and doffed wigs and long church-wardens' pipes, that one by one dropped from slowly opening mouths, slid along unbuttoned waistcoats and snapped their slender stems upon the floor, until everybody except Mr. Vernon and our hero was snoring the eighth repetition of the events of that famous day.
The room was hot; the drawing of many breaths thick with fatigue, beef and Burgundy induced a meditative atmosphere; the fire no longer blazed, but sank to an intense crimson glow. Mr. Vernon counted up his gains, while Mr. Lovely pondered his losses in silence.
At last the latter got up suddenly.