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34 As he pulled it in again Tom Erichsen scrambled into the coach upon the other side, an unpleasant smile upon his set face and his thick stick in his hand. He had not promised to avoid Blaydes if chance threw them together, and chance had done so, for Tom was on his way to make his bed once more in the fields.

“You infernal ruffian,” roared the Captain. “Hi! coachman, the police!”

“You miserable swindler,” retorted Tom, “if you don’t stop the coach at once and step outside with me you’re a ruined man. I’ll go on to the Hardings with you and expose you—”

“The Hardings!”

“Yes; you see, I know all your little plans.”

“Little plans!!”

The Captain gasped and stopped the coach.

CHAPTER V

A BLOODLESS VICTORY

half-pay officer was a thick-set, youngish man, with a smooth, sly, yellow face, and hair like spun steel. He walked with a chronic limp and a stout, gold-headed cane, and was seldom without the genial, flattering smile that had tempted Tom Erichsen, and other young flies before him, into a parlour from which no pocket returned intact.

But since then Tom fancied Blaydes had found a richer dupe; he looked a much more prosperous scamp. The coach-lamps struck sparks from a very brilliant pin