“When a man enters upon a game of hazard with another, ’tis the very essence of honour that the chances should be equal between them. Now, my most excellent young host, had you played me with loaded dice to-night—” The other broke out foaming at the mouth, with the acrid rage of the helplessly insulted. “My lord Rockhurst—! I will suffer no man, nay, not even under my own roof, to dare such an insinuation. The dice, my lord—” He made a frantic gesture toward the card-table. But, like the play of water upon red iron, Rockhurst’s cool voice fell upon his heat:— “Nay—the dice are right enough—so are the cards. We were but us two, moreover, so you had no accomplice. These are the elements of honest play, as I was about to expound to you—since, indeed, your father’s only son, and a lad of your experience in court and camp, appears to require such expounding.” He changed his tone for one more subtly keen, as the surgeon his blade at the delicate moment: “But another element in play, between gentlemen, is that one player should not stake against the other sums he does not possess.” Farrant, wincing, ran his hands desperately through his fair locks; he fell into an arm-chair and, still clutching his love curls, drew them across his face. From behind this screen, after a long pause, he spoke muffled words:— “Your lordship seems to forget the circumstances. To help your lordship to pass this time of tedium (since no horses that ever were foaled could take your coach on through these snows); having the responsibility of entertaining your lordship … since you can find little pleasure but in the cards … and having, in these cursed twenty-four hours, lost every stiver of money, every rood of the poor land I possess … zounds! my lord, that I should have risked a few more throws with nought but my ruin to back them … damnation, my lord Rockhurst, since but a turn of the dice might have set us even again!—these are hard words, it seemeth to me! Aye, and hard thoughts.” Thus set forth, his own case seemed to the youth so strong that he lifted his head again and displayed his countenance as wrathful and full of reproach now as, a minute ago, it had been shamed. Lord Rockhurst crossed one lean leg over the other, settled his elbows at the most comfortable angle the carven arms of the chair would afford, and let his brilliant hazel eye wander to the red embers and become dreamy once more. * * * * * For a long while silence reigned again in the oak parlour of Farrant Chace.