Martingale was a married man, and there was no danger of HIS riding
by the Fitzbattleaxe carriage. A fortnight after the above events, his
lordship was prancing by her Grace's great family coach, and chattering
with Lady Gwinever about the strange wager.
"Do you know what a pony is, Lady Gwinever?" he asked. Her ladyship said
yes: she had a cream-colored one at Castle Barbican; and stared when
Lord Martingale announced that he should soon have a thousand ponies,
worth five-and-twenty pounds each, which were all now kept at Coutts's.
Then he explained the circumstances of the bet with Bagnigge. Parliament
was to adjourn in ten days; the season would be over! Bagnigge was lying
ill chez lui; and the five-and-twenty thousand were irrecoverably his.
And he vowed he would buy Lord Binnacle's yacht--crew, captain, guns and
all.
On returning home that night from Lady Polkimore's, Martingale found
among the many billets upon the gold plateau in his antichambre, the
following brief one, which made him start--
"DEAR MARTINGALE.--Don't be too sure of Binnacle's yacht. There are
still ten days before the season is over; and my ponies may lie at
Coutts's for some time to come.
"Yours,
"BAGNIGGE.
"P. S.--I write with my left hand; for my right is still splintered up
from that confounded fall.
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