George Fenn - Sir Hilton's Sin

“Well – say sometimes, my dear; but you know you are orful nubbly now and then, and you say things to me that buzz in my ears like bluebottles in a stable window. I don’t grumble, but I’m sorry for the guv’nor, that I am.”

“Ah! he has a deal to grumble at. Wasted as good as three fortunes.”

“Woho, my lass! Steady there! Not wasted. Spent ’em like a noble English baronet, and he always had his money’s worth. Yes, we did.”

“We indeed! Wasted everything, he did, on the Turf, and then was sold up disgraceful. Just like a pore man might be.”

“Gently, my lass, gently!” cried Mark. “Sold up, and disgraceful? Nothing of the kind. The luck was again’ us, and we can’t quite meet our engagements; so we lets the things come to the hammer. Old Tat knocks ’em down to the highest bidder at High Park Corner, and we pays like gentlemen as far as the money goes. What more would you have till the luck turns and we pay up again?”

“Ah! you’re a nice pair. It was time you were both off the Turf. Neither of you ever cared.”

“Don’t say that, my lass. I cared a deal, and when I see my satin-skinned beauties knocked down – ”

“Your what?”

“’Osses, my gal, ’osses – the tears quite come in my eyes.”

“I dessay,” said Jenny, tartly. “I believe you think much more of a horse than you ever did about me.”

“Nay, you don’t, Jenny. You know better. Man’s love for a hoss ain’t the same as what he feels for his sweetheart. You know that. But a chap of the right sort as understands ’osses can’t help loving the beautiful pets. I don’t mind yer laughing at me. I quite cried when our La Sylphide was knocked down and I had to say good-bye to her. I don’t know what I should ha’ done if I hadn’t known she was going into good quarters with someone who’d love her. All right! It’s gallus weak, I suppose, but I did, and you may laugh.”

“I wasn’t laughing, Mark,” said the girl, holding out her hand. “I was only smiling at you. I like it. Shows your ’art’s in the right place.”

“Jenny!” And “business,” as theatrical people say.

“Now, don’t, Mark. That’ll do. Suppose Sir Hilton was to come?”

“Let him,” said the groom, sharply. “I ain’t ashamed of loving the dearest, sweetest little lass in the country, though she has got a sharp tongue that goes through me sometimes like a knife.”

“All the better for you, Master Mark. You want talking-to, for you’ve been a deal too wild.”

“Nay, nay, nay, Jenny; ’ossy, but never wild.”

“Let’s see,” said Jane, going on giving touches to the breakfast-table. “But stop a minute. What do you want here? Her ladyship wouldn’t like it if she caught you.”

“Ain’t she gone out?”

“Oh, yes, I forgot. Well, Sir Hilton’ll be down directly, and he’ll ask you why you’ve come.”

“No, he won’t. I shall have first word.”

“What do you mean?”

“Ask him if he wouldn’t like the ’orse put in the dogcart to run over to Tilborough.”

“What for?”

“To see the race, my gal.”

“What!”

“Our old mare La Sylphide’s going to run.”

“Our old mare indeed! Go to the race! Why, there’d be a regular eruption.”

“So there would; but I do wish the guv’nor would risk it this once.”

“He’d better! So that was the reason you come here, was it?”

“Well, partly, Jenny. You see, I thought I might get a minute with you alone.”

“I don’t believe it,” said Jane, frowning, but with eyes looking very bright. “You pretend and pretend, and yet all the time you’re sneaking off every chance you get over to Oakland.”

“Well, I do, my lass; I own to that.”

“There,” cried the girl, “and yet you have the impidence to talk to me.”

“Of course, you know why I go.”

“Yes; to see that showy lady’s maid that comes over to our church sometimes.”

“Tchah! I go over to the stables to have a look at La Sylphide. Oh, Jenny, she is a picture now.”

“Look here, Mark; ’pon your word, now, is that the truth?”

“Why, you dear, jealous, little darling, you know it is. Look here, Jenny; she runs to-day for the cup, and, with Josh Rowle up, it’s a certainty.”

“I know better than that, Mark. There’s no certainty in horse-racing.”

“Oh, yes, there is, if you’ve got the right mare and the man up who understands her, as Josh does, when he isn’t on the drink. The guv’nor and Josh Rowle are the only two men who can ride La Sylphide, and I tell you it’s a certainty. I’ve put the pot on this time.”

“What for?”

“Because I want it to boil.”

“What, to make a what-you-may-call-it – a mash for La Sylphide?”

“Na-a-a-y!” cried Mark. “What a dear, innocent, little darling you are, Jenny! We call it putting the pot on when we lay every dollar we can scrape together, and more too, on a horse winning.”

“And that’s what you’ve done?” said Jenny, quietly.

“That’s right, little one; every mag.”

“Then you ought to be ashamed of yourself, Mark.”

“What!” cried the young man in dismay.

“Didn’t you promise me that if I’d keep comp’ny with you, you’d give up all your old tricks you learnt with Master – Sir Hilton – and be steady?”

“And so I have been. Saved every penny, and thought of nothing but getting on for you.”

“Yes, it looks like it,” said the girl, sarcastically.

“Well, so it do. This is only a bit of a flutter.”

“Flutter, indeed!”

“And what’s it for?”

“To make a fool of yourself again, like your master.”

“Oh, is it?” said the young fellow, sturdily. “You know well enough that if I saved all my wages I couldn’t save enough to take a pub in twenty years. If La Sylphide passes the post first to-day she’ll land me enough to take a nice little roadside hotel, something like Sam Simpkins, the trainer at Tilborough, only not so big, of course; nice little place, where I can plant my wife behind the bar, and do a nice trade with visitors, somewhere down in the country where there’s waterfalls and mountains and lakes.”

“And that is why you’ve begun betting again, Mark?” said the girl, a little more softly.

“Yes, that’s what I meant, my gal, for I didn’t think you’d take it like that. Our mare – I mean Lady Tilborough’s – La Sylphide being a certainty. But if she loses, I shan’t go and marry some rich woman for the sake of her money.”

There was silence for a few moments, Mark turning a little away to take a pink out of his buttonhole and begin nibbling the stalk, and Jenny turning in the other direction so that her lover should not see a little sign of weakness in her eyes, which she strove hard to master, and so well that in a short time, when she spoke again, her voice sounded sharp and without a tremor.

“A pretty game, I’m sure, sir. Races indeed, and betting too! Sir Hilton had better take your precious dogcart and go La Sylphiding. You mark my words, if he does her ladyship will be sure to find it out, and then if she suspects you had anything to do with it you’ll get the sack.”

“Well, I don’t know as it matters much,” said the groom, drearily. “You don’t seem to understand a fellow, and it’s all wrong here, and it’s miserable to see the poor guv’nor so down in the mouth.”

“Down in the mouth indeed, after missus’s father found the money to pay all his debts, and four thousand pounds for him to go into Parliament as an M.P.”

“Tchah! Such nonsense! Our Sir Hilton ain’t going to give up the Turf and chuck hisself away like that.”

“Chuck hisself away?”