A Wild Night.
The morning after the hunt was gloomy and dispiriting, for the weather had undergone a complete change daring the night, and now, instead of blue sky and a sunny landscape, a dense vaporous curtain hung over the kloofs, everywhere thick, heavy and impenetrable, while from the dull grey sky fell a continuous and soaking drizzle.
“I say, but it’ll be poor fun riding back in this,” exclaimed Hicks, contemplating the spongy ground splashed by the drippings from the iron roof. “We shall have to wait until it clears.”
“Shall we? Speak for yourself, Mr Hicks. We are not made of sugar,” said Ethel, mockingly. She was in high spirits this morning and brimming over with mischief.
“Now that is rational,” put in a voice behind her. “Hadn’t we better start at once?”
She turned. “Oh, so you are afraid of the elements, too. Then out of consideration for you two, we shall have to wait. Or shall we go on and leave them, Laura?”
“They deserve it,” said Laura. Then dubiously: “It’s a nuisance, though, because I know aunt will be expecting us back.”
“Now look here,” rejoined Claverton, quietly. “Your aunt specially authorised me to see that you did nothing rash. Getting wet through under circumstances totally unnecessary is an eminently rash proceeding. Wherefore I am constrained to lay an embargo on anything of the kind. More especially as by two o’clock there will not be a cloud in the sky.”
“Won’t there? Two to one there will. What shall it be?” cut in Armitage.
“Jack never bets. At least I heard him not many days ago striving hard to convince a Methodist parson of that fact,” said Claverton, appealing to the company in general.