With Reginald to supply them with honesty, with easy-going spendthrifts, like Blandford and Pillans, to supply them with money, and with a cad like Durfy to do their dirty work for them, they were in as comfortable and hopeful a way as the promoters of such an enterprise could reasonably hope to be.
The trio at the Shades soon forgot Reginald in the delights of one another's sweet society.

They played billiards, at which Mr Shanklin won.

They also played cards, at which, by a singular coincidence, Mr Shanklin won too.

They then went to call on a friend who knew the "straight tip" for the Saint Leger, and under his advice they laid out a good deal of money, which (such are the freaks of fortune) also found its way somehow into Mr Shanklin's pocket-book.

Finally, they supped together, and then went home to bed, each one under the delusion that he had spent a very pleasant evening.
Reginald was far from sharing the same opinion as he paced home that evening.