"Well, if you paid him his interest next April, wouldn't he be satisfied?"
"Of course he'd be satisfied, but how am I to pay it? I tell you, it will take me every penny I have for the expenses. There's no margin for paying moneylenders.
"I've made my calculations. By scraping and screwing, with some money I've hid away, I can just manage to run the colt, pay expenses, and back him for a thousand—and that's all."
"But, see here. Why not back him for only eight hundred, and pay Mr. Lewis his two hundred?"
"Now, there you are," said French. "And that shows you haven't grasped the big thing I'm after. Suppose I pay Lewis his two hundred, and only back the colt for eight hundred, do you know what that would make me lose if he starts at, say, a hundred to one, and wins? I'd lose twenty thousand pounds. It's on the cards that for every hundred pounds I lay on Garryowen I'll win ten thousand."
"So that, if he wins, and you have the full thousand on him?"
"I'll win a hundred thousand."
"And if he loses?"
"Faith, I'll be stripped as naked as Bryan O'Lynn."