“Oh!” cried Sir Hilton, getting up and stamping about the room, tearing at his hair, already getting thin on the crown.
“Thank you, Hilt dear, thank you. I always knew you for a sympathetic soul. Can you imagine anything worse?”
“Yes—yes!” cried Sir Hilton; “ten times worse.”
“What?”
“I’m on her too!”
“You?”
“Yes, to the tune of four thousand pounds.”
“You, Hilt!” cried the lady, with her eyes brightening, and instead of sympathy something like ecstasy in her tones. “I thought you had ‘schworred off.’”
“Yes, of course—I had—but the mare—short of money—such faith in her—I put on—lot of my wife’s money. Hetty, how could you have managed so badly with Josh Rowle? What have you done? Oh, woman, woman! You always were the ruin of our sex! Why did you come with such horrible news as this? I’m a ruined man.”
“Yes, Hilt, and I’m a ruined woman.”