THE STRAIGHT RIDER.
(FROM "BLACK AND WHITE?" BY PERMISSION.)
"My dear Mabel, how pale you look! It is this hot room. I am sure Lord Saint Sinnes will not mind taking you for a little turn in the garden—between the dances."
My Lord Saint Sinnes—or Billy Sinnes as he is usually called by his friends—shuffled in his high collar. It is a remarkable collar, nearly related to a cuff, and it keeps Lord Saint Innes in remembrance of his chin. If it were not that this plain young nobleman were essentially a gentleman, one might easily mistake him for a groom. Moreover, like other persons of equine tastes, he has the pleasant fancy of affecting a tight and horsey "cut" in clothes never intended for the saddle.
The girl, addressed by her somewhat overpowering mother as Mabel, takes the proffered arm with a murmured acquiescence and a quivering lip. She is paler than before.
Over his stiff collar Lord Saint Sinnes looks down at her—with something of the deep intuition which makes him the finest steeplechaser in England. Perhaps he notes the quiver of the lip, the sinews drawn tense about her throat. Such silent signals of distress are his business. Certainly he notes the little shiver of abject fear which passes through the girl's slight form as they pass out of the room together. Their departure is noted by several persons—mostly chaperons.
"He must do it to-night," murmurs the girl's mother with a complacent smile on her worldly, cruel face, "and then Mabel will soon see that—the other—was all a mistake."
Some mothers believe such worn-out theories as this—and others—are merely heartless.
Lord Saint Sinnes leads the way deliberately to the most secluded part of the garden. There are two chairs at the end of a narrow pathway. Mabel sits down hopelessly. She is a quiet-eyed little girl, with brown hair and gentle ways. Just—in a word—the sort of girl who usually engages the affections of blushing, open-air, horsey men. She has no spirit, and those who know her mother are not surprised. She is going to say yes, because she dare not say no. At least two lives are going to be wrecked at the end of the narrow path.
Lord Saint Sinnes sits down at her side and contemplates his pointed toes. Then he looks at her—his clean-shaven face very grave—with the eye of the steeplechase rider.
"Miss Maddison"—jerk of the chin and pull at collar—"you're in a ghastly fright."
Miss Maddison draws in a sudden breath, like a sob, and looks at her lacework handkerchief.
"You think I'm going to ask you to marry me?"
Still no answer. The stiff collar gleams in the light of a Chinese lantern. Lord Saint Sinnes's linen is a matter of proverb.
"But I'm not. I'm not such a cad as that."
The girl raises her head, as if she hears a far-off sound.
"I know that old worn——. I daresay I would give great satisfaction to some people if I did! But … I can't help that."
Mabel is bending forward, hiding her face. A tear falls on her silk dress with a little dull flop. Young Saint Sinnes looks at her—almost as if he were going to take her in his arms. Then he shuts his upper teeth over his lower lip, hard—just as he does when riding at the water jump.
"A fellow mayn't be much to look at," he says, gruffly, "but he can ride straight, for all that."
Mabel half turns her head, and he has the satisfaction of concluding that she has no fault to find with his riding.
"Of course," he says, abruptly, "there is s'm' other fellow?"
After a pause, Miss Maddison nods.
"Miss Maddison," says Lord Saint Sinnes, rising and jerking his knees back after the manner of horsey persons, "you can go back into that room and take your Bible oath that I never asked you to marry me."
Mabel rises also. She wants to say something, but there is a lump in her throat.
"Some people," he goes on, "will say that you bungled it, others that
I behaved abominably, but—but we know better, eh?"
He offers his arm, and they walk toward the house.
Suddenly he stops, and fidgets in his collar.
"Don't trouble about me," he says, simply. "I shan't marry anyone else—I couldn't do that—but—but I didn't suspect until to-night, y'know, that there was another man, and a chap must ride straight, you know."