“Well, I sent the pound, and within a week received a post-office order for four pounds eight as the result of its investment. The same week I bet again—two pounds this time—and won one pound fifteen. That was over six pounds between Monday and Saturday. ‘This _is_ the way that fortunes are made,’ I laughed to myself, like a fool.
“Well, he kept me going, I don’t exactly recollect how, between Ascot and Goodwood, which is about seven weeks, not more. Sometimes I won, sometimes I lost, but, on the whole, I was in pocket. I was such a fool at last, that I was always for betting more than he advised. I’ve got his letters at home now, in which he says, ‘Pray don’t be rash; take my advice, and bear in mind that great risks mean great losses, as well as great gains, at times.’ Quite fatherly, you know! The infernal scoundrel!
“Well, one day there came a telegram to the office for me. I was just in from my dinner. It was from B—y. ‘Now you may bag a hundred pounds at a shot,’ said he. ‘The odds are short, but the result _certain_. Never mind the money just now. You are a gentleman, and I will trust you. You know that my motto has all along been ‘Caution.’ Now it is ‘Go in and win.’ It is _sure_. Send me a word immediately, or it may be too late; and, if you are wise, put a ‘lump’ on it.’
“That was the infernal document—the death-warrant of all my good prospects. It was the rascal’s candour that deceived me. He had all along said, ‘Be cautious, don’t be impatient to launch out;’ and now this patient careful villain saw his chance, and advised, ‘Go in and win.’ I was quite in a maze at the prospect of bagging a hundred pounds. To win that sum the odds were so short on the horse he mentioned, that fifty pounds had to be risked. But he said that there was _no_ risk, and I believed him. I sent him back a telegram at once to execute the commission.
“The horse lost. I knew it next morning before I was up, for I had sent for the newspaper; and while I was in the midst of my fright, up comes my landlady to say that a gentleman of the name of B—y wished to see me.
“I had never seen him before, and he seemed an easy fellow enough. He was in a terrible way—chiefly on my account—though the Lord only knew how much _he_ had lost over the ‘sell.’ He had come up by express purely to relieve my anxiety, knowing how ‘funky’ young gentlemen sometimes were over such trifles. Although he had really paid the fifty in hard gold out of his pocket, he was in no hurry for it. He would take my bill at two months. It would be all right, no doubt. He had conceived a liking for me, merely from my straightforward way of writing. Now that he had had the pleasure of seeing me, he shouldn’t trouble himself a fig if the fifty that I owed him was five hundred.