Page:Littell's Living Age - Volume 128.djvu/818

808 rolled ungracefully off on his back, while the honest beast galloped off in all the enjoyment of the chase. To stop in the middle of a run to catch a loose horse is the perfection of unselfishness, but Yorke was equal to the sacrifice, possibly because he anticipated another check in a few minutes; and galloping after the loose horse he brought it back to where the owner was striding in his boots over the heavy furrows.

"Thank ye, sir," said the dismounted cavalier, wiping the mud off his coat as he spoke; "it's awfully kind of you, I'm sure: these fences are infernally blind, or my horse would never have fallen. Why, I'm blessed," he continued, "if it's not Yorke! Well, this is a start; fancy meeting you here!" and Yorke recognized in the speaker an old friend, Teddy Round of the Artillery, whom he had last met at Peshawur, an eager sportsman, but in whom a certain rotundity of figure caused an ineradicable tendency to part company from his saddle on the smallest provocation. There was no time, however, to exchange inquiries if the field was to be overtaken; but later in the day the two came together again, and finding that their roads were in the same direction, jogged home together. Captain Round, whose battery had lately returned to England, was on leave and staying with his family who lived in the neighbourhood, and so taking the opportunity to enjoy a turn of fox-hunting. "Not bad fun in its way," said the captain, "but not to be named in the same breath with pig-sticking." "One falls softer, however," observed Yorke; whereupon Round inquired if his people too belonged to these parts; and the other replied that he had come down on a visit to the sister of his old friend Braddon, of Kirke's Horse — Round must have known him — who was killed in the Mutiny. Round said he knew him by name of course, although he had never met him, and a very fine fellow he must have been. Was Miss Braddon living at Castleroyal? and Yorke explained that the lady was married to Mr. Peevor, who lived at a place called "The Beeches," about five miles ahead.

"Oh! that's where you are!" cried Teddy, with a long whistle; "Peevor and Hanckes, heh! and a very snug billet too you find it, I'll be bound."

"What do you mean?" asked Yorke, feeling that he was on the brink of a revelation.

"Why, do you mean to say you don't know that you are in the land of balsam? — Peevor and Hanckes, the Clarified Balsam people; that's your Mr. Peevor, of course: fancy your not knowing it!" and while Yorke was silently wondering how such an obvious connection should not have occurred to him, his companion carried on a running commentary on the wealth accruing to the fortunate proprietors of that celebrated patent medicine. "Something like a billet, as I said; wines A 1 and cook first-rate. I dined there once or twice when I was at home the year before last — old Peevor always asks a fellow to dinner if he meets him, you know; but I haven't called this time: my people don't visit at 'The Beeches,' so there is an awkwardness about the thing, you see. It is all dashed nonsense, of course; but women are such sticklers about these matters, and Peevor's being in trade does the mischief."

"I thought everybody was in trade nowadays."

"So they are," retorted Round, "and small blame to them; I ain't a bit proud myself, although I am so extremely well connected; and if you were to strike everything that smacked of the counter out of your visiting-list, you'd have to keep yourself pretty much to yourself down in these parts; but you must draw the line somewhere, and my people draw it at clarified balsam."

"You seem to forget. Master Ted, that Mr. Peevor is a friend of mine."

"All right, my dear fellow," continued the irrepressible captain: "considering that you didn't know who your friend was a minute ago, surely there needn't be any ceremony on the point between old chums like you and me. Not that Peevor isn't a very good sort of fellow, if he wasn't such a walking price-current; but Hanckes the partner is something too awful. You haven't seen Hanckes yet, I suppose — 'Anks, as he calls himself. An uncommon clever fellow is 'Anks, though; it's he who does the clarifying part of the business. Peevor found the money for starting the concern: he began with fifty thousand pounds, which they say he spent in advertising, and now he doesn't know which way to turn, he's so crowded up with money. Balsam has proved a highly remunerative investment, as clarified by the patent process of Peevor and Hanckes, I can tell you. And it's not at all bad stuff, either, especially for horses with sore backs; we used it by the gallon in my battery. The girls are awfully nice too; when ——"

"Now, Teddy, be careful what you are