“It was a letter from Lord Effingdale,” continued the Baronet, still busied in the pursuit, “a letter written after the Newmarket settling, my Lord; and if I should be unfortunate enough not to find it, I must only trust to my memory for its contents.” Lord Norwood gave another bow, slighter and colder than the former, as though to say that he acquiesced perfectly, without knowing in what. “Ah! here it is! here it is!” cried Sir Stafford, at last detecting the missing document, which he hastily opened and ran his eyes over. “This letter, my Lord,” continued he, “announces that, in consequence of certain defalcations on your part, the members of the 'Whip Club' have erased your Lordship's name from their list, and declared you incapacitated from either entering a horse, or naming a winner for the stakes in future. There, there, my Lord, is the paragraph, coupled with what you will doubtless feel to be a very severe but just comment on the transaction.” Norwood took the letter and read it leisurely, as leisurely and calmly as though the contents never concerned him, and then, folding it up, laid it on the chimney-piece beside him. “Poor Effingdale!” said he, smiling; “he ought to spell better, considering that his mother was a governess. He writes 'naming' with an 'e.' Didn't you remark that?” But as Sir Stafford paid no attention to the criticism, he went on: “As to the 'Whip,' I may as well tell you, that I scratched my own name myself. They are a set of low 'Legs,' and, except poor Effy, and two or three others of the same brilliant stamp, not a gentleman amongst them.” “The defalcation is, however, true?” asked Sir Stafford. “If you mean to ask whether a man always wins at Doncaster or Newmarket, the question is of the easiest to answer.” “I certainly presume that he always pays what he loses, my Lord,” replied Sir Stafford, coloring at the evasive impertinence of the other. “Of course he does, when he has it, Sir Stafford; but that is a most essential condition, for the 'Turf' is not precisely like a mercantile pursuit.” Sir Stafford winced under the flippant insolence with which this was spoken. “There is not exactly a fair way to calculate profit, nor any assurance against accidental loss. A horse, Sir Stafford, is not an Indiaman; a betting man is, therefore, in a position quite exceptional.” “If a man risks what he cannot pay, he is dishonorable,” said Sir Stafford, in a short, abrupt tone. “I see that you cannot enter into a theme so very different from all your habits and pursuits. You think there is a kind of bankruptcy when a man gets a little behind with his bets. You don't see that all these transactions are on 'honor,' and that if one does 'bolt,' he means to 'book up' another time. There was George, your own son--” “What of him? what of George?” cried Sir Stafford, with a convulsive grasp of the chair, while the color fled from his cheek, and he seemed ready to faint with emotion.