THE HAUGHTYSHIRE HUNT. 157 



piebald. Scratches freel}' adorned his physiognomy, and his 

 nose looked about twice its natural size. 



" Yes," said he, in answer to Binkie's lifted eyebrows and 

 vacuous smile : " Come a buster again. Just my luck, ain't it ? 

 And yet you hear people say you're always so dull in the 

 country. Dull ! What do you think ? The early post brought 

 me four unpaid bills, a judgment summons, and a notice in 

 bankruptcy. I get snubbed by that girl I'm so ' gone ' on 

 — Miss Comely, you know — at the meet, and then when we 

 are in for the fastest thing of the season, this silly brute of 

 a horse goes and tumbles, bustle over hairpins, at a thorn 

 fence. Dull, indeed ! Dull be d — d ! " wound up Tommy 

 with considerable w^armth. 



" Oh, really ! Well, I didn't fall off, you know." 



" Who the said anything about falling oft", you silly 



cuckoo ! " burst out Tommy so furiously that Travers posi- 

 tively shook in his top-boots, and wished devoutly that he 

 hadn't spoken. " Can't you understand the difference between 

 falling off and your horse falling with you, you blithering 

 idiot?" 



" Oh, real " began Binkie. 



" Oh, shut your head," retorted Tommy savagely, jobbing 

 his horse unconsciously with the spur, and moving about half 

 a length ahead of his companion. It was not often that the 

 Baronet lost his temper with Binkie, exasperating as some of 

 the latter's sayings were. Such luxuries as a ' let-out ' at his 

 host could only be safely indulged in when Tommy was not in 

 want of a fiver, and such occasions were indeed rare with him, 

 as we know. 



As they rode in silence up the carriage-drive of The 



