Rupert forced a laugh. Again, at this moment of tense excitement, he realised what it would mean if the horse lost.
Ruin! Not just for himself, that was nothing. But disgrace! That was something his father would never face. The blasting of the old man's hopes. All that he had lived for and dreamed of. Unsteadily Rupert counted out five sovereigns.
"I'd better stick this on the brute as well, it's all or nothing," he said, forcing a smile. And he began to fight his way to the rails where the bookmakers shouted the odds.
Ruby laid her hand on his arm. "Give it to me, I'll do it. You always say I'm lucky to you—and I may get better odds."
Rupert nodded and made a passage for her. "All right. If you smile at the beggar like that he'll lay you fives, I should think."
The crowd swallowed her up. She forced her way to the rails at Tattersall's Ring. Rupert saw the long black plume of her French hat nodding in the breeze. He saw her hand the money to a bookmaker and receive a ticket in exchange.
Then a cry like a great chorus rent the air. "They're off!"
Rupert leapt to his position on the stand and putting up his glass watched the race.
A good start, though one horse was left. It was not Paulus, so he did not care. One horse out of the way!
He watched the horses climb the hill, the colours of the jockeys made brilliant blots against the blue sky. The great human ant-hill was still now, silent, too. The whole thing looked like a cinematograph picture; the horses like clockwork animals.