rew up at the door of the Ship
Inn. Iver Verstage came out and welcomed him.

"I've had a trouble with Clutch," said the ostler. "He lay down as
we got out of Gorlmyn, and neither whip nor kicks 'ud make him
stir. I tried ticklin', but t'wern't no good neither. How long
this 'ud have gone on I dun know; I took him out o' th' shafts, and
got him back to Gorlmyn, because some men helped me wi' him, and
pulled at his tail, and twisted his carcass about till his nose
pointed to the stable of the Angel. Then he condescended to get up
and go to the inn. I shouldn't ha' got him away at all but that a
notion came into my head as helped. I got the ostler to saddle
and bride the gray mare, and mount her afore old Clutch's naked
eyes. And I told the ostler to ride ahead a little way. Then, my
word! what airs and jinks there were in Clutch; he gambolled and
trotted like a colt. It was all a show-off afore the gray mare.
The ostler--I knew him very well, he's called Tom Tansom, and it's
a coorious thing now, he only cut his wise teeth about three months
afore, and suffered won'erful in cutting 'em. But that's neither
here nor there. Tom Tansom, he rode ahead, and old Clutch went
after as if he were runnin' with the hounds. But I must tell you,
whilst I was in Gorlmyn, that Widow Chivers came with the carrier,
and as she was wantin' a lift, I just took her up and brought her
on. She's been ter'ible bad, she tells me, with a cold, but she's
better now--got some new kind o' lozenges, very greatly recommended.
There's a paper given along wi' 'em with printed letters from all
sorts o' people as has benefited by these lozenges. They're a
shillin' and a ha'penny a box. Betty sez they've done her a power
of good."

"Go on with your account of old Clutch. You're almost as bad as he
with your stoppages."

"I'm tellin' right along. Well, the ostler he trotted on till he
came to a turn in the road, and then he went down a lane out o'
sight. But old Clutch have been racin' on all the way, thinkin'
the mare had got a distance ahead. I'd a mighty difficulty to make
him stop at the corner to set down Betty Chivers, and again here.
Though he's roarin' like the roarin' of the sea, he wants to be on
again and ketch up the gray mare. It's a pleasure that I've dun
the old vagabond. Has Matabel been here?"

"Yes, she has; and has gone."

"Where to?"

"Of course, home, to the Bowl."

"Not she. She's got that screwed into her head tight as a nut