66 GARRYOWEN 



spectacles that would be coming. Faith, and I'll 

 have to get a chaperon. You might have blown 

 me away with a fan when she said who she was. 

 But I didn't let on, did I? I didn't show the 

 start she'd given me? Are you sure? " 



Assured on this point, Mr French poured him- 

 self out another glass of whisky. He explained 

 that he'd got Miss Grimshaw " out of an advertise- 

 ment." Then, much to the edification of Mr 

 Dashwood, he went into the bailiff business, the 

 beauty of Mp and Tuck, the price Colonel Sher- 

 bourne had paid, explaining that it was not the 

 money he cared about so much as the injury it 

 would have done him in Sherbourne's estimation 

 if the horses had not been dehvered. 



It was an adventure after the heart of Bobby 

 Dashwood, who, in his short life, had dealt freely 

 and been dealt with by money-lenders. Mr 

 Dashwood was what women call a " nice-looking 

 boy," but he was not particularly intellectual 

 when you got him off the subjects he had made 

 particularly his own. He had failed for Sand- 

 hurst. If a proficiency in cricket and fives had 

 been allowed to count he would have got high 

 marks, but they wanted mathematics, and Mr 

 Dashwood could not supply this requirement; 

 in French, too, he was singularly deficient. The 

 deficiencies of Mr Dashwood would have furnished 

 out half a dozen young men well equipped for 

 failure in business, and that is why, I suppose, he 

 managed to make such a success of life. 



