“Well, the face, and the hat, and the green pearl in the scarf-pin remind me uncommonly of Downy Bulwrag; though I do not know him very well; and it can hardly be. He is out of England, I am told, and if he had been here I should have met him in the ring. For he always comes to bet, and he is a very deep file, though he knows very little of racing. He comes to invest for old Pot sometimes, and it is the only time Pot ever makes any money.” “But he may have gone off, when he saw me,” I said; “he would hardly dare to run the risk of meeting me again.” “Wouldn’t he? It would take ten of you to drive him. Downy Bulwrag is the coolest hand I ever came across. I give him a wide berth myself; for there is nothing but bad luck to be made out of him. He is worse than his mother, a thousand times; and everybody knows what she is. I am very glad you missed him. For he would have had the best of you.” “Would he indeed?” I exclaimed rather hotly. “I am not a milksop, Sam; and I fear no man on earth, when I have reason to believe that he has wronged me.” “You are strong enough, Kit,” Sam returned, with some contempt; “we are all aware of that, my friend. You are stronger, I dare say, than Downy Bulwrag, although he is no chicken. But he is one of the first boxers in England. He has made a hobby of it. He can hold his own with the biggest prize fighters. He could double you up, before you got near him. And it is not only that, my boy. Likely enough he would not have touched you; for he never loses his temper they say. He would have had you up before the Bench to-morrow. He can always put anybody in the wrong. And then how should we have gone on to-night? No, it was a lucky thing that you got no chance to tackle him, supposing it was Downy, which I scarcely can believe. All the fellows are gone who could have told me. But I dare say I shall find out in London. Now let us have some grub, or we shall miss our train.” Sam Henderson’s words set me pondering deeply. I had not intended to assault that stranger, whoever he might be, but just to bring him to a halt, and make him tell me who he was, and what he meant by coming on the sly into my uncle’s garden, and watching me in that peculiar manner. Now I felt pretty certain as to who he was, in spite of the difficulties Sam had found about it. If my description tallied so closely with that of Donovan Bulwrag, it was likely to be no one else who had come so to spy upon me. For there was the motive at once made plain. The man, who had robbed me of my wife, would naturally come to see how I bore it, to learn perhaps what sort of adversary I was, and to gloat upon my lonely misery. I felt delighted when I called to mind that I had indulged in no sighs or soliloquy that evening, but worked away steadily and even cheerfully, whistling every now and then for company to myself. My deadly enemy could not say—“Poor devil, how miserable he looks!”