Ezra Baroni looked at him quietly, then without another word went out--to a congenial task.
"Dat big child is a fool," mused the subtler and gentler Jew.

"Vengeance is but de breath of de vind; it blow for you one day, it blow against you de next; de only real good is monish." The Seraph had ridden back from Iffesheim to the Bad in company with some Austrian officers, and one or two of his own comrades.

He had left the Course late, staying to exhaust every possible means of inquiry as to the failure of Forest King, and to discuss with other members of the Newmarket and foreign jockey clubs the best methods--if method there were--of discovering what foul play had been on foot with the horse.
That there was some, and very foul too, the testimony of men and angels would not have dissuaded the Seraph; and the event had left him most unusually grave and regretful.
The amount he had lost himself, in consequence, was of not the slightest moment to him, although he was extravagant enough to run almost to the end even of his own princely tether in money matters; but that "Beauty" should be cut down was more vexatious to him than any evil accident that could have befallen himself, and he guessed pretty nearly the terrible influence the dead failure would have on his friend's position.
True, he had never heard Cecil breathe a syllable that hinted at embarrassment; but these things get known with tolerable accuracy about town, and those who were acquainted, as most people in their set were, with the impoverished condition of the Royallieu exchequer, however hidden it might be under an unabated magnificence of living, were well aware also that none of the old Viscount's sons could have any safe resources to guarantee them from as rapid a ruin as they liked to consummate.

Indeed, it had of late been whispered that it was probable, despite the provisions of the entail, that all the green wealth and Norman Beauty of Royallieu itself would come into the market.

Hence the Seraph, the best-hearted and most generous-natured of men, was worried by an anxiety and a despondency which he would never have indulged, most assuredly, on his own account, as he rode away from Iffesheim after the defeat of his Corps' champion.
He was expected to dinner with one of the most lovely of foreign Ambassadresses, and was to go with her afterward to the Vaudeville, at the pretty golden theater, where a troupe from the Bouffes were playing; but he felt anything but in the mood for even her bewitching and--in an marriageable sense--safe society, as he stopped his horse at his own hotel, the Badischer Hof.
As he swung himself out of saddle, a well-dressed, quiet, rather handsome little man drew near respectfully, lifting his hat--it was M.
Baroni.