Particular about the horses he drove, Gammon saw with pleasure the young dark-bay cob, stylishly harnessed, which pawed delicately as he mounted the neat little trap put at his disposal.  It is the blessedness of a mind and temper such as his that the things which charm at the beginning of life continue to give pleasure, scarce abated, as long as the natural force remains.  At forty years of age Gammon set off about his business with all the zest of a healthy boy.  The knowledge he had gained, all practical, and, so to speak, for external application, could never become the burden of the philosopher; if he had any wisdom at all it consisted in the lack of self-consciousness, the animal acceptance of whatever good the hour might bring.  He and his bay cob were very much on the same footing; granted but a method of communication and they would have understood each other.  Even so with his “bow-wows,” as he called them.  He rose superior to horse and dog mainly in that one matter of desire for a certain kind of female companionship; and this strain of idealism, naturally enough, was the cause of almost the only discontent he ever knew.

Joyously he rattled about the highways and by-ways of greater London.  The position he had now obtained was to become a “permanency”; to Quodling & Son he could attach himself, making his services indispensable.  One of these days—­not just yet—­he would look in at Mrs. CIover’s and see whether she still kept in the same resentful mind towards him.  It was an odd thing that nowadays he gave more thought to Mrs. Clover than to Minnie.  The young girl glimmered very far away, at a height above him; he had made a mistake and frankly recognized it.  But Mrs. Clover, his excellent friend of many years, shone with no such superiority, and was not above rebuke for any injustice she might do him.  Probably by this time she had forgotten her fretfulness, a result of overstrung nerves.  She would ask his pardon—­and ought to do so.

He thought of Polly Sparkes, but always with a peculiar smile, inclining to a grimace.  Polly had “come round” in the most astonishing way.  But she would “come round” yet more before he had done with her.  His idea was to take Polly to Dulwich and show her the bow-wows; he saw possibilities of a quiet meal together at the inn.  The difficulty was to reassure her natural tremors, without losing the ground he had gained by judicious approaches.

About the middle of July he prevailed upon her to accept his invitation, and to come alone, though Polly continued to declare that she hated dogs, and that she had never in her life gone to so remote and rural a spot as Dulwich without a “lady friend” to keep her in countenance.

“Everything must have a beginning,” said Gammon merrily.

“If you let those people know, I’ll never speak to you again.”

She referred to Mrs. Bubb and her household, of whom she had never ceased to speak with animus.