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Updated: May 23, 2025
The adjutant and riding-master, making holiday, are both present "to the front," as they call it, enjoying exceedingly the jests and waggeries of their younger comrades. The orderly-officer, conspicuous by his belt, sits at one end of the long table. Lord Bearwarden occupies the other, supported on either side by his two guests, Tom Ryfe and Dick Stanmore. It is the night of Mrs.
Ryfe" when on the cards lay such a prize as the Bearwarden coronet, when she need only put out her hand and take Dick Stanmore, with his brown locks, his broad shoulders, his genial, generous heart, for better or worse! It was unbearable.
Then with every pulsation of the blood Big Ben seemed to be striking inside his brain till something gave way with a great whizz! like the mainspring of a watch, and Tom Ryfe was perfectly quiet and comfortable henceforth.
"On the 11th," repeated Tom "delighted, my lord at eight o'clock, I suppose," and turned his horse's head soberly towards Piccadilly, proceeding at a walk, as one who revolved certain reflections, not of the most agreeable, in his mind. A dinner at the barracks was usually rather an event with Mr. Ryfe, but on the present occasion he forgot all about it before he had gone a hundred yards.
Ryfe would have felt this, could he have seen the gestures of the woman he loved, while she tore his letter into shreds could he have marked the carriage of her haughty head, the compression of her sweet, resolute lips, the fierce energy of her white, cruel hands.
Ay, and missis too! Hooray! for the cruel eyes, and the touch-me-not airs. The proud, pale-faced devil! as thought Jim wasn't quite the equals of the dirt beneath her feet. Steady! Here he comes." And looming through the fog, Mr. Ryfe approached with cautious, resolute step; carrying a revolver in his pocket, prepared to use it, too, on occasion, with the fearless energy of a desperate man.
Ryfe had timed his observation well; the two gentlemen were now proceeding slowly up Berners Street, and had arrived nearly opposite the house that contained Simon's painting-room, its hard-working artist, its frequent visitor, its beautiful sitter, and its Fairy Queen.
Tom Ryfe must be paid his money. To this conclusion, at least, Maud's reflections never failed to lead. Without such initiatory proceeding it was useless to think of demanding the return of that written promise. But how to raise the funds? After much wavering and hesitation, Miss Bruce resolved at last to pawn her diamonds.
Tom Ryfe was one of those men rarely seen in the saddle or on the box, but who, nevertheless, always seem to have a horse to dispose of, whatever be the kind required.
Ryfe, with an offensive air of appropriation, walks off with Miss Bruce arm-in-arm, towards the sequestered path that leads to the garden-gate, that leads to the shady lane, that leads to the shining river! It was all labour and sorrow now. People who called this sort of thing amusement, thought Dick, would go to purgatory for pastime, and a stage farther for diversion.
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