"Oh, yes, sir; you was dead and buried, his father died, and he became
Sir Mark. Yes, sir, he's a barrownet now, and got all your tin; and, my
word, he does make it fly!"

CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE.

JERRY TO THE FRONT.

Dick Smithson found himself face to face with a problem that grew harder
to solve the more he tried, and, as he lay awake at night, the words of
the old, old ballad used to come to him:--

"And for as you have made your bed, so on it you must lie."

A barrack bed, too--a very hard, thin, single Glo'ster-cheese sort of
bed! And yet it seemed at the first sight so easy to jump out of it, go
and see the colonel--no; he could talk to Lieutenant Lacey, who was
always so friendly, and that gentleman would tell the colonel.

Oh, it would be simple enough! So long as it meant his voluntary exile,
it was not of so much consequence; and he had always kept in reserve the
time when he could go back to his old position in society. But now he
found that when he leaped down it was from a high perpendicular rock,
and the base of that rock stood in. Around, too, it was smooth; and,
now jumping back was out of the question, climbing appeared impossible.

What was to be done? He could not sit still and let Mark hold his title
and position without a struggle; but how to begin?

Naturally enough, the old state of calm passed away, and Dick's brain
was in a state of effervescence as he waited three days for an
opportunity to meet and consult with Jerry Brigley. For this had been
planned at parting, after Jerry had sworn to be silent until some plan
of action had been decided upon.

At last Jerry and he met again, and this time went off for a walk
towards the country, accidentally taking the road which Dick had
followed when he first entered the town.

For some time the great subject they had met to discuss was avoided, and
they talked about the country round, with its hills and hop-gardens,
till Jerry drifted from a remark on the beauty of a sheep-cropped,
velvet-green field, with its lawn-like grass, into a lesson on one of
the follies of the day.

"Yes, sir," he said; "feel how soft it is under your feet! Turf's a
lovely thing when it's lawns; but when it's horse-racing, and gets hold
on yer tight, it's a sort o' Bedlam-Hanwelly business. Don't you never
bet, sir. If I hadn't never betted, I should ha' been a rich man now,
with two hundred pound in the savings bank, instead of being a private
soldier