"No, to put on the winning horse. I want the right tip. What is it?" "I'll make no such infamous contracts with you, sir," cried Sir Hilton, furiously, "and I'm going out on business--business of vital importance." "Of course, uncle. I understand," said the boy, mockingly. "And I'm not going to leave you behind to make mischief between me and your aunt. Come along; I shall take you with me in the dogcart I have waiting." "All right, uncle. I know." "And as a prisoner, sir." "That's your sort, uncle." "You wicked young wretch! Come along, quick!" "Quick as quicksilver, uncle," cried the boy, grinning, as, evading his uncle's clutch, he thrust his hand through his elder's arm. "Here, I may as well put the pot on as it seems to be something extra good, so you'll have to make it two fivers, uncle, and two make ten." Sir Hilton uttered a wicked word totally unfitted for the ears of youth standing in such close relationship to him, and a few minutes later the dogcart--with uncle and nephew in front, and Mark grinning to himself as he sat behind pressing the bag so that it could not drop off--spun out of the yard gate, and off and away by the back lanes for the Tilborough road, now pretty lively with vehicles of all sorts, all bound in the same direction. Fate plays strange pranks! CHAPTER TEN. HOW JANE LISTENED AND TOLD. Just at the same time Lady Lisle's barouche was getting very close to the swing gates and the carriage drive of the Denes, with her ladyship leaning back. "Was not that a vehicle of some kind leaving the stable yard, Thomas?" she said to the coachman. "Yes, my lady." "Could you see what it was?" "Not quite, my lady, but I think it was ours, with Black Nelly in the sharps, for I heard one of the clicks she gives when she oversteps with her off hind hoof." Lady Lisle wondered, and started the next minute when she heard another click. But this time it was the latch of the swing gate, half-drowned by the carriage wheels on the drive leading to the front door. Then she fell to wondering again, and alighted to enter the house. Just as she stepped down, a telegraph-boy came up on his bicycle, smiling, and ready to touch his cap, as he held out to her one of the familiar tinted envelopes, with prophetic notions about Christmas-boxes in the future. "A message!" she said, changing colour for the moment, as thoughts of the possibilities so often hidden beneath one of those official envelopes crossed her mind. "Yes, m'lady. Any answer?" As head of the establishment of the Denes, bought and paid for with the money which formed her dowry, she took the message as a matter of course, and opened it without glancing at the direction, dropped the envelope on to the stone steps, and the pleasant breeze whisked it in among the shrubs.