“Then I shall tell you,” he went on, “that I have objections. Their nature I have no time to disclose at present further than to say that any woman who puts a nice girl like her niece upon the horse she is riding to-day is a bad lot.”
Barclay’s expression changed. “What is the matter with the horse?” he demanded.
“I’m not sure that I know all that is the matter with him,” said Carty, “but I wouldn’t ride him over a fence for the Bank of England.”
“Do you know that, or are you just talking?” said Barclay.
“I ought to know,” said the other. “I owned him. After what he did to me, I ought to have shot him. We’d better jog along,” he added, “or we shall get pocketed and never get through the gate.”
The huntsman had called his hounds and was carrying them to the next cover, and Mr. Carteret set his horse to a trot and struggled for a place in the vast scarlet-coated throng that surged toward the gate leading out of the meadow. At the same time Barclay disappeared.
The vast scarlet-coated throng that surged toward the gate
“I hope he tells Lady Withers about the horse,” said Mr. Carteret to himself. “If she doesn’t keep her hands off him, I shall tell her several things myself.”