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THE BUBBLE BURST. 101

Williams—“clearing one’s-self is easy enough—what,
do you take me fora thief? It’s easy enough to
clear myself about the money—I don’t look at every
guinea that is given me—I received only the other
day some money from Mrs. Osborne !—What a fuss
is here about the money !—but the point is not to let
it come out about taking Miss Bannerman to Alton.
And then there is that wretched Evans dunning
about his old dog-tit of a horse and his tumble-down
gig—I was a fool for ever going tohim! The fellow
is as importunate as death. Now, I say, Reynolds,
cannot you borrow the money for me? Won't your
aunts or somebody lend it you?”

“You owe me already two pounds fifteen,” said
- Reynolds,—“ and as to borrowing from my aunts I do
not believe that they will lend me any.”

“Oh, for heaven's sake, go and try!” said Wil-
liams, deeply excited—“ this shall be the last time
that I ever will borrow from you. I'll turn overa
new leaf, I do assure you I will! Ill be as steady
as you are!”

We need not go through all the conversation that
ensued, the flatteries, the entreaties, the confessions
of past folly and extravagance, and the humble, con-
trite promises of amendment, all of which so worked
upon Reynolds that he consented to make one more
attack on his aunts. | 7

When he reached his aunts, he found them in a
state-of vast excitement. Mrs. Proctor, the great
town gossip, had just been there, and had brought a
* long exaggerated history of how the heads of-all the
apprentices in the town were turned with the players,
and how, in particular, both of Mr. Osborne’s young
men were in love with one of them; they had been

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