"Exactly. Then I'll give you a hundred guineas."

"And how am I to get my money, sir?"

"The first time you are out, come to Albion Villa, in Barkington, and I'll have it all ready for you."

"And suppose you were to say, 'No: you didn't ought ever to have been confined'?"

"I must trouble you to look in my face again, Mr. Brown. Now, do you see treason, bad faith, avarice, ingratitude, rascality in it?"

"Not a grain of 'em," said Brown, with an accent of conviction. "Well, now, I'll tell you the truth; I can read a gent by this time: and I'm no more afeared for the money than if I had it in my hand. But ye see, my stomach won't let me do it."

This was a sad disappointment; so sudden, too. " Your stomach?" said Alfred ruefully. "'What do you mean?"

"Ay, my stomach. Wouldn't _your_stomach rise against serving a man that had done you the worst turn one man can do another--been and robbed you of your sweetheart?"