The long line of colours across the track becomes a
shapeless clump and then draws out into a long string. "What's that in
front?" yells someone at the rails. "Oh, that thing of Hart's," says
someone else. But the Oracle hears them not; he is looking in the mass
of colour for a purple cap and grey jacket, with black arm bands. He
cannot see it anywhere, and the confused and confusing mass swings round
the turn into the straight.

Then there is a babel of voices, and suddenly a shout of "Bendemeer!
Bendemeer!" and the Oracle, without knowing which is Bendemeer, takes
up the cry feverishly. "Bendemeer! Bendemeer!" he yells, waggling his
glasses about, trying to see where the animal is.

"Where's Royal Scot, Charley? Where's Royal Scot?" screams one of his
friends, in agony. "'Ow's he doin'?"

"No 'ope!" says the Oracle, with fiendish glee. "Bendemeer! Bendemeer!"

The horses are at the Leger stand now, whips are out, and three horses
seem to be nearly abreast; in fact, to the Oracle there seem to be a
dozen nearly abreast. Then a big chestnut sticks his head in front
of the others, and a small man at the Oracle's side emits a deafening
series of yells right by the Oracle's ear:

"Go on, Jimmy! Rub it into him! Belt him! It's a cake-walk! A cake-walk!"
The big chestnut, in a dogged sort of way, seems to stick his body clear
of his opponents, and passes the post a winner by a length. The Oracle
doesn't know what has won, but fumbles with his book. The number on the
saddle-cloth catches his eye--No. 7; he looks hurriedly down the page.
No. 7--Royal Scot. Second is No. 24--Bendemeer. Favourite nowhere.

Hardly has he realised it, before his friends are cheering and clapping
him on the back. "By George, Charley, it takes you to pick 'em." "Come
and 'ave a wet!" "You 'ad a quid in, didn't you, Charley?" The Oracle
feels very sick at having missed the winner, but he dies game. "Yes,
rather; I had a quid on," he says. "And" (here he nerves himself to
smile) "I had a saver on the second, too."

His comrades gasp with astonishment. "D'you hear that, eh? Charley
backed first and second. That's pickin' 'em if you like." They have a
wet, and pour fulsome adulation on the Oracle when he collects their
money.

After the Oracle has collected the winnings for his friends he meets the
Whisperer again.

"It didn't win?" he says to the Whisperer in inquiring tones.

"Didn't win," says the Whisperer, who has determined to brazen th