"Stan, I haven't even remembered lately that there was such a thing as the Guineas. So you backed it?"
"At sixties. And that's the tenth I told her she was on to, for the tip."
"But-a tenth? You must have been plunging, Stan."
"Twenty pounds. Twice as much as my normal ceiling. Bill did a bit of good too. Going to give his missus a fur coat."
"So Kominsky won."
"Won by a length and a half on a tight rein; and was that a turn up for the book!"
"Well," Robert said, stacking the notes and banding them, "if the worst comes to the worst and they end up bankrupt, the old lady can always do a fair trade as a tipster."
Stanley eyed his face for a moment in silence, apparently not happy about something in his tone. "Things are pretty bad, 'm?" he said.
"Fierce," said Robert, using one of Stanley's own descriptions.
"Bill's missus went to the court," Stan said, after a pause. "She said she wouldn't believe that girl even if she told her there were twelve pennies in a shilling."