“Gentleman—confidential man! Why, he ain’t half a man, and he ain’t the good sanctified chap he pretends to be, and I’d tell him so to his face. Look here, Jenny; he may be her ladyship’s, but he ain’t going to be your confidential man. But there, I ain’t no right to say nothing, I suppose, and this about finishes it. Ladyship or no ladyship, whether the guv’nor comes or whether he don’t, I’m going over to Tilborough racecourse ’safternoon, and if La Sylphide don’t pull it off for me I shall make a hole in the water and leave it to cover me up.”
“Mark!” said Jenny, softly, with her eyes half closed. “Well?”
“I can’t help Mr Trimmer speaking civil to me when he comes to see her ladyship about the accounts.”
“Oh, no, of course not,” said the young man, sarcastically.
“I can’t really, Mark—dear. He always seems to me like one of those nasty evats that come down in the stone passage in damp weather, and just as they do when they’ve rubbed a little of the whitewash on to their throats.”
“Jenny!”
“Yes, Mark dear. I do hope La Sylphide will win.”
“Oh!”
“Ahem!”
Smart-looking, well-built, dapper little Sir Hilton Lisle, looking the beau-ideal of a horse-loving country gentleman, entered the breakfast-room.