it, for there'll be the deuce to pay else. The last time she paid my
play-debts, I swore I would not touch a dice-box again, and she'll
keep her word, Strong, and dissolve partnership, if I go on. I wish I
had three hundred a year, and was away. At a German watering-place
you can do devilish well with three hundred a year. But my
habits are so d----reckless: I wish I was in the Serpentine. I wish I
was dead, by Gad, I wish I was. I wish I had never touched those
confounded bones. I had such a run of luck last night, with five for
the main, and seven to five all night, until those ruffians wanted to
pay me with Altamont's bill upon me. The luck turned from that minute.
Never held the box again for three mains, and came away cleaned out,
leaving that infernal check behind me. How shall I pay it? Blackland
won't hold it over. Hulker and Bullock will write about it directly to
her ladyship. By Jove, Ned, I'm the most miserable brute in
all England."

It was necessary for Ned to devise some plan to console the baronet
under this pressure of grief; and no doubt he found the means of
procuring a loan for his patron, for he was closeted at Mr. Campion's
offices that day for some time. Altamont had once more a guinea or two
in his pocket, with a promise of a farther settlement; and the baronet
had no need to wish himself dead for the next two or three months at
least. And Strong, putting together what he had learned from the
colonel and Sir Francis, began to form in his own mind a pretty
accurate opinion as to the nature of the tie which bound the two men
together.