due to his rowing, and I
believe it was. I did not so much mind that, for my line was
chiefly sculling. I had won in my own College, and entered for
Henley, where it was generally thought that I had a fair chance of
winning the Diamonds. However, I heard a fortnight before the
entries closed that he was out on the river every morning sculling.
I knew what it was going to be, and was not surprised when his name
appeared next to mine in the entries.

"We were drawn together, and he romped in six lengths ahead of me,
though curiously enough he was badly beaten in the final heat. He
stroked the University afterwards. Though I was tried I did not
even get a seat in the eight, contrary to general expectation, but
I know that it was his influence that kept me out of it.

"We had only one more tussle, and again I was worsted. I went in
for the Newdigate--that is the English poetry prize, you know. I
had always been fond of stringing verses together, and the friends
to whom I showed my poem before sending it in all thought that I
had a very good chance. I felt hopeful myself, for I had not heard
that he was thinking of competing, and, indeed, did not remember
that he had ever written a line of verse when at school. However,
when the winner was declared, there was his name again.

"I believe that it was the disgust I felt at his superiority to me
in everything that led me to ask my father to get me a commission
at once, for it seemed to me that I should never succeed in
anything if he were my rival. Since then our lives have been
altogether apart, although I have met him occasionally. Of course
we speak, for there has never been any quarrel between us since
that fight, but I know that he has never forgiven me, and I have a
sort of uneasy conviction that some day or other we shall come into
contact again.

"I am sure that if we meet again he will do me a bad turn if
possible. I regard him as being in some sort of way my evil genius.
I own that it is foolish and absurd, but I cannot get over the
feeling."

"Oh, it is absurd, Captain Mallett," the girl said. "He may have
beaten you in little things, but you won the Victoria Cross in the
Crimea, and everyone knows that you are one of the best shots in
the country, and that before you went away you were always in the
first flight with the hounds."

"Ah, you are an enthusiast, Bertha. I don't say that I cannot hold
my own with most men at a good many things where not brains, b