“Young man, you don’t value my good intentions; and you are not at all charmed with my new dodge, for fetching a horse up before he can think. You saw I never touched your bridle. Well, never mind that. I’m not going to teach you. How are things going on, at your crib, my boy?” “Famously;” I answered, for it was not likely that I should discourse of my troubles to him. “Nothing could be better, Mr. Henderson; and since you have proved your new dodge satisfactory, I will say ‘Good-night,’ and beg you not to do it to me again.” “What a confounded muff you are!” he continued with his slangy drawl, which he had picked up perhaps at Tattersall’s; “do you think that I would have come down this beastly lane, on a dirty night like this, without I had something important to say? How about your Kitty?” This was a little too familiar, and put me on my dignity. At the same time it gave me a thrill of pleasure, as a proof of the public conclusion upon a point of deep private interest. “If you happen to mean, in your cheeky style, a young lady known as Miss Fairthorn, and the niece of Miss Coldpepper, of the Hall; I can only tell you that she is in London, with her father, the celebrated Captain Fairthorn.” “A pinch for stale news—as we used to say at school. Perhaps I could give you a fresher tip, my boy; but I daresay you don’t care to hear it. Perhaps you have put your money on another filly. So have I; and this time it is a ripper.” Little as I liked his low manner of describing things too lofty for his comprehension, I could not let him depart like this. He lit a cigar under _Spanker’s_ nose, as if he had been nobody, and whistling to his bull-terrier Bob, turned away as if everything was settled. But I called him back sternly, and he said, “Oh well, if you want to hear more, you must turn into my little den down here.” I followed him through a white gate which he opened in the high paling that fenced his paddocks, and presently we came to a long low building, more like a shed than a dwelling-house, but having a snug room or two at one end. “This is my doctor’s shop,” he said; “and it serves for a thousand other uses. No patients at present—will be plenty by-and-by. Come into my snuggery, and have something hot. I will send a fellow home with your old screw, and tell the governor not to expect you to supper. Rump-steak and onions in ten minutes, Tom, and a knife and fork for this gentleman! Now, Kit, put your trotters on the hob, but have a pull first at this pewter.” This was heaping coals of fire on my head, after all that I had done to him; and I said something clumsy to that effect. He treated it as if it were hardly worth a word; and much as I love to be forgiven, I like to have done it to others much better.