ght-cap," and though Osgood and Howard-Jones carried on a heated
discussion about the merits of perch bits, he paid not the slightest
attention to what was being said. Waterman and Van Vort occasionally
tried to chaff him, but he was so snappish in his manner that they
wisely decided to let him alone. Meanwhile Duncan was thinking of the
time, at Newport, when, jogging home after a day with the hounds, he had
asked Helen Osgood to marry him. He had felt confident that she would do
so, but instead, he got laughed at for his sincerity, and he had been
laughed at ever since. He had often brought himself to the point of
believing that he did not care for her, but the next time he was brought
under her subtle influence he was compelled to acknowledge that he was
still under her spell. Other women had surrendered to him with a
facility that destroyed the pleasure of an exciting contest, but other
women were not Helen Osgood.

The next morning none of the house party put in an appearance before
eleven o'clock, and it was not until luncheon that they all met
together. Some of the men had, it is true, been out to the kennels, and
Osgood and Howard-Jones had taken out a tandem--much to the horror of
neighboring Sabbath-keepers--but Mrs. Osgood and the girls managed to
keep secluded until the luncheon-hour. Dinner was the only formal meal
at Oakhurst, and there was a freedom about the life that made it very
attractive to the men. Any sort of lounging costume was permissible
during the daytime, and the guests straggled in at luncheon without
regard for promptness. No one waited for the others, and the last to
come was the last to be served. The conversation was chiefly about
horses and dogs, with social gossip for a relish, but no topic more
intellectual than the last French novel or the latest comedy at Daly's
was permissible. In fact, any one bold enough to inaugurate a literary
or political discussion would have been greeted with a stare of mingled
pity and astonishment. If any of the guests were acquainted with matters
literary or artistic, they were usually discreet enough to remain silent
out of deference to the host; but on one occasion a school friend of
Helen's, from Boston, hearing some remarks about the last story of
Bourget, took the opportunity to start a discussion upon the poetic
psychology of Sully-Prudhomme, which was greeted in a manner that made
the poor girl fancy she had said something very indiscreet. At the fi