Read it through once

Allusion was made to a little girl coming home from school, and a piece of paper on the pavement. But Ketley could not concentrate his thoughts on the main lines of the story, and it was lost in various dissertations. But the company was none the less pleased with it, and willingly declared that bookmaking was only a game for mugs. Get on a winner at forty to one, and you could make as much in one bet as a poor devil of a bookie could in six months, fagging from race-course to race-course. They drank, argued, and quarrelled, until Esther noticed that Sarah was looking very pale. Old John was quite helpless; Journeyman, who seemed to know what he was doing, very kindly promised to look after him.