“And then,” as he confided to Dartie the same evening in the course of a game of billiards at the Red Pottle, “I lost him.”

Dartie twirled complacently at his dark moustache. He had just put together a neat break of twenty-three⁠—failing at a “Jenny.” “And who was she ?” he asked.

George looked slowly at the “man of the world’s” fattish, sallow face, and a little grim smile lurked about the curves of his cheeks and his heavy-lidded eyes.

“No, no, my fine fellow,” he thought, “I’m not going to tell you .” For though he mixed with Dartie a good deal, he thought him a bit of a cad.

“Oh, some little love-lady or other,” he said, and chalked his cue.