xceedingly good company. His face became pink and his
eye wet with the excellence of the joke he was brewing in his deeps. He
slobbered over his food and spilt it. Mrs. Woodburn watched him with
amused sympathy.

"You've been up to something you shouldn't, dad," she said. "I know
you."

He held up a shaking hand in protest.

"Now don't you, Mar!" he said. "I been to church--that's all I done. Mr.
Haggard preach a booriffle sermon on the 'Oly Innocents. 'There's some
is saints,' he says, and he looks full glare at me; 'and there's some as
isn't.' And he looks at his missus. 'There's some as is where they ought
to be Sundays,' and he looks full glare at me. 'And there's some as
isn't.' And he stares at the empty seat aside o' me. Yes, my dear,
you'll cop it on the crumpet to-morrow when he comes to see you, and
you'll deserve it, too."

After lunch, as the old man left the room, he beckoned mysteriously to
Silver, and toddled away down the passage with hunched shoulders to his
sanctum.

The young man followed him with amused eyes. He knew very well what was
coming.

Once inside his office, Mat closed the door in his most secretive way.

"Only one thing for it," he whispered hoarsely. "The gal must ride."

Silver stared out of the window.

"But will she?"

The old man messed with his papers.

"She mayn't for me," he mumbled. "She might for someone--to help him out
of a hole. I'll try her anyway. If she will I'll put a thousand on
myself."

* * * * *

An hour later Silver was smoking a cigarette in the darkness of the
wainscoted dining room, when the door burst open.

Boy came in upon him swift and radiant. She was in her blue skirt and
blouse again, and her hair was like a halo against the dark wainscoting.
The glory of the gallop was still upon her.

He rose to her, challenged and challenging.

She crossed the room to him, and stood with her hand on the mantelpiece.
She did not laugh, she did not even smile, but there was in her the deep
and quiet ecstasy that causes the thorn to blossom in beauty after a
winter of reserve. It seemed to him that she was swaying as a rose sways
in a gale, yet anchored always to the earth in perfect self-possession.

As always, she came straight to the point.

"Do you want me to ride him in the National?" she asked.

"I don't mind," he answered nonchalantly.

"Have you backed him?"

"Not yet."

"Are you going to?"

"I might--if