Cashel Byron's Profession

"He has nothing else to do," said Alice, carelessly. "Here he is. He

has picked out a capital horse for us, too."

Meanwhile, Mellish had been dragged from beneath the train and

seated on the knee of one of his companions. He was in a stupor, and

had a large lump on his brow. His eye was almost closed. The man

with the crushed nose now showed himself an expert surgeon. While

Cashel supported the patient on the knee of another man, and the

rest of the party kept off the crowd by mingled persuasion and

violence, he produced a lancet and summarily reduced the swelling by

lancing it. He then dressed the puncture neatly with appliances for

that purpose which he carried about him, and shouted in Mellish's

ear to rouse him. But the trainer only groaned, and let his head

drop inert on his breast. More shouting was resorted to, but in

vain. Cashel impatiently expressed an opinion that Mellish was

shamming, and declared that he would not stand there to be fooled

with all the evening.

"If he was my pal 'stead o' yours," said the man with the broken

nose, "I'd wake him up fast enough."

"I'll save you the trouble," said Cashel, coolly stooping and

seizing between his teeth the cartilage of the trainer's ear.

"That's the way to do it," said the other, approvingly, as Mellish

screamed and started to his feet. "Now, then. Up with you."

He took Mellish's right arm, Cashel took the left, and they brought

him away between them without paying the least heed to his tears,

his protestations that he was hurt, his plea that he was an old man,

or his bitter demand as to where Cashel would have been at that

moment without his care.

Lord Worthington had taken advantage of this accident to slip away

from his travelling companions and drive alone to his lodgings in

Jermyn Street. He was still greatly excited; and when his valet, an

old retainer with whom he was on familiar terms, brought him a

letter that had arrived during his absence, he asked him four times

whether any one had called, and four times interrupted him by scraps

of information about the splendid day he had had and the luck he was

in.

"I bet five hundred even that it would be over in a quarter of an

hour; and then I bet Byron two hundred and fifty to one that it

wouldn't. That's the way to doit; eh, Bedford? Catch Cashel letting

two hundred and fifty slip through his fingers! By George, though,

he's an artful card. At the end of fourteen minutes I thought my

five hundred was corpsed. The Dutchman was full of fight; and Cashel

suddenly turned weak and tried to back out of the rally. You should

have seen the gleam in the Dutchman's eye when he rushed in after

him. He made cock-sure of finishing him straight off."