When we last left Captain Scarborough, he had just lost an additional sum of two hundred and twenty-seven pounds to Captain Vignolles, which he was not able to pay, besides the sum of fifty pounds which he had received the day before, as the first instalment of his new allowance. This was but a bad beginning of the new life he was expected to lead under the renewed fortunes which his father was preparing for him. He had given his promissory note for the money at a week\'s date, and had been extremely angry with Captain Vignolles because that gentleman had, under the circumstances, been a little anxious about it. It certainly was not singular that he should have been so, as Captain Scarborough had been turned out of more than one club in consequence of his inability to pay his card debts. As he went home to his lodgings, with Captain Vignolles\'s champagne in his head, he felt very much as he had done that night when he attacked Harry Annesley. But he met no one whom he could consider as an enemy, and therefore got himself to bed, and slept off the fumes of the drink.

On that day he was to return to Tretton; but, when he awoke, he felt that before he did so he must endeavor to make some arrangements for paying the amount due at the end of the week. He had already borrowed twenty pounds from Mr. Grey, and had intended to repay him out of the sum which his father had given him; but that sum now was gone, and he was again nearly penniless. In this emergency there was nothing left to him but again to go to Mr. Grey.

As he was shown up the stairs to the lawyer\'s room he did feel thoroughly ashamed of himself. Mr. Grey knew all the circumstances of his career, and it would be necessary now to tell him of this last adventure. He did tell himself, as he dragged himself up the stairs, that for such a one as he was there could be no redemption. "It would be better that I should go back," he said, "and throw myself from the Monument." But yet he felt that if Florence Mountjoy could still be his, there might yet be a hope that things would go well with him.

Mr. Grey began by expressing surprise at seeing Captain Scarborough in town. "Oh yes, I have come up. It does not matter why, because, as usual, I have put my foot in it. It was at my father\'s bidding; but that does not matter."

"How have you put your foot in it?" said the attorney. There was one way in which the captain was always "putting" both his "feet in it;" but, since he had been turned out of his clubs, Mr. Grey did not think that that way was open to him.

"The old story."

"Do you mean that you have been gambling again?"

"Yes;—I met a friend last night and he asked me to his rooms."

"And he had the cards ready?"

"Of course he had. What else would any one have ready for me?"

"And he won that remnant of the twenty pounds which you borrowed from me, and therefore you want another?" Hereupon the captain shook his head. "What is it, then, that you do want?"

"Such a man as I met," said the captain, "would not be content with the remnant of twenty pounds. I had received fifty from my father, and had intended to call here and pay you."

"That has all gone too?"

"Yes, indeed. And in addition to that I have given him a note for two hundred and twenty-seven pounds, which I must take up in a week\'s time. Otherwise I must disappear again,—and this time forever."

"It is a bottomless gulf," said the attorney. Captain Scarborough sat silent, with something almost approaching to a smile on his mouth; but his heart within him certainly was not smiling. "A bottomless gulf," repeated the attorney. Upon this the captain frowned. "What is it that you wish me to do for you? I have no money of your father\'s in my hands, nor could I give it you if I had it."

"I suppose not. I must go back to him, and tell him that it is so." Then it was the lawyer\'s turn to be silent; and he remained thinking of it all till Captain Scarborough rose from his seat and prepared to go. "I won\'t trouble you any more Mr. Grey," he said.

"Sit down," said Mr. Grey. But the captain still remained standing. "Sit down. Of course I can take out my check-book, and write a check for this sum of money;—nothing would be so easy; and if I could succeed in explaining it to your father during his lifetime, he, no doubt, would repay me. And, for the sake of auld lang syne, I should not be unhappy about my money, whether he did so or not. But would it be wise? On your own account would it be wise?"

"I cannot say that anything done for me would be wise,—unless you could cut my throat."

"And yet there is no one whose future life might be easier. Your father, the circumstances of whose life are the most singular I ever knew—"

"I shall never believe all this about my mother."

"Never mind that now. We will pass that by for the present. He has disinherited you."

"That will be a question some day for the lawyers—should I live."

"But circumstances have so gone with him that he is enabled to leave you another fortune. He is very angry with your brother, in which anger I sympathize. He will strip Tretton as bare as the palm of my hand for your sake. You have always been his favorite, and so, in spite of all things, you are still. They tell me he cannot last for six months longer."

"Heaven knows I do not wish him to die."

"But he thinks that your brother does. He feels that Augustus begrudges him a few months\' longer life, and he is angry. If he could again make you his heir, now that the debts are all paid, he would do so." Here the captain shook his head. "But as it is, he will leave you enough for all the needs of even a luxurious life. Here is his will, which I am going to send down to him for final execution this very day. My senior clerk will take it, and you will meet him there. That will give you ample for life. But what is the use of it all, if you can lose it in one night or in one month among a pack of scoundrels?"

"If they be scoundrels, I am one of them."

"You lose your money. You are their dupe. To the best of my belief you have never won. The dupes lose, and the scoundrels win. It must be so."

"You know nothing about it, Mr. Grey."

"This man who had your money last;—does he not live on it as a profession? Why should he win always, and you lose?"

"It is my luck."

"Luck! There is no such thing as luck. Toss up, right hand against left for an hour together, and the result will be the same. If not for an hour, then do it for six hours. Take the average, and your cards will be the same as another man\'s."

"Another man has his skill," said Mountjoy.

"And uses it against the unskillful to earn his daily bread. That is the same as cheating. But what is the use of all this? You must have thought of it all before."

"Yes, indeed."

"And thinking of it, you are determined to persevere. You are impetuous, not thoughtless, with your brain clouded with drink, and for the mere excitement of the thing, you are determined to risk all in a contest for which there is no chance for you,—and by which you acknowledge you will be driven to self-destruction, as the only natural end."

"I fear it is so," said the captain.

"How much shall I draw it for?" said the attorney, taking out his check-book,—"and to whom shall I make it payable? I suppose I may date it to-day, so that the swindler who gets it may think that there is plenty more behind for him to get."

"Do you mean that you are going to lend it me?"

"Oh, yes."

"And how do you mean to get it again?"

"I must wait, I suppose, till you have won it back among your friends. If you will tell me that you do not intend to look for it in that fashion, then I shall have no doubt as to your making me a legitimate payment in a very short time. Two hundred and twenty pounds won\'t ruin you, unless you are determined to ruin yourself." Mr. Grey the meanwhile went on writing the check. "Here is provided for you a large sum of money," and he laid his hand upon the will, "out of which you will be able to pay me without the slightest difficulty. It is for you to say whether you will or not."

"I will."

"You need not say it in that fashion;—that\'s easy. You must say it at some moment when the itch of play is on you; when there shall be no one by to hear: when the resolution if held, shall have some meaning in it. Then say, \'there\'s that money which I had ............