“Then I will come. Order me some gloves, Harry. I’ve no change.”
“You never do have any. Here! Tell them to send half a dozen pairs for Sir Matthew, and put them down to me. What’s the matter with your lip?”
“My lip, sir?”
“Yes; it’s bleeding.”
“Cracked, sir.”
“Yes: fevered. Drink too much. That will do. Nines, or tens—the gloves?”
“No, no: eights,” cried Sir Matthew; and the dragoon went on out of the barrack gates, with his face growing grey.
“This is being a soldier,” he muttered. “The scoundrel! If I thrash him till he can’t move, they’ll shoot me. But no, it can’t be. She’s too good a girl. Impossible. Besides, I shall be there.”
He went straight to the livery-stable keeper, and arranged for the best four horses he had, and gave the man a hint.
“Very private, you know.”