The dying man's eyes roved over the ring of faces. "I don't know," he
whispered, so faintly that Soane had to bring his ear very near his
lips. "The parson--was to have got her to Tamplin's--for me. He put her
in the wrong carriage. He's paid. And--I'm paid."
With the last word the small-sword fell clinking to the floor. The dying
man drew himself up, and seemed to press his hand more and more tightly
to his side. For a brief second a look of horror--as if the
consciousness of his position dawned on his brain--awoke in his eyes.
Then he beat it down. "Tamplin's staunch," he muttered. "I must stand by
Tamplin. I owe--pay him five pounds for--"
A gush of blood stopped his utterance. He gasped and with a groan but no
articulate word fell forward in Soane's arms. Bully Pomeroy had lost his
last stake!
Not this time the spare thousands the old squire, good saving man, had
left on bond and mortgage; not this time the copious thousands he had
raised himself for spendthrift uses: nor the old oaks his
great-grand-sire had planted to celebrate His Majesty's glorious
Restoration: nor the Lelys and Knellers that great-grand-sire's son,
shrewd old connoisseur, commissioned: not this time the few hundreds
hardly squeezed of late from charge and jointure, or wrung from the
unwilling hands of friends--but life; life, and who shall say what
besides life!