He never paid me; and as you was the young gen'lman in the cheer, I comes to you." _Now_ Eric knew for the first time what Brigson had meant by his threatened revenge.

He saw at once that the man had been put up to act in this way by some one, and had little doubt that Brigson was the instigator.

Perhaps it might be even true, as the man said, that he had never received the money.

Brigson was quite wicked enough to have embezzled it for his own purposes.
"Go," he said to the man; "you shall have the money in a week." "And mind it bean't more nor a week.

I don't chuse to wait for my money no more," said Billy, impudently, as he retired with an undisguised chuckle, which very nearly made Eric kick him down stairs.
What was to be done?
To mention the subject to Owen or Montagu, who were best capable of advising him, would have been to renew the memory of unpleasant incidents, which he was most anxious to obliterate from the memory of all.