And now they were seated in the very front of the stand, Elizabeth and Margaret together; the gentlemen of their party were dispersed about the course, and Margaret could distinguish in the distance the slight figure of Harriet Conway, guiding her spirited horse among the company, followed by her father and brother. She soon, however, lost sight of her in the crowd, and began to feel impatient for the first race to begin.
Now, their places being very good, attracted the envy of a couple of insolent dragoon officers, who had just arrived, and who tried by pushing in a most unjustifiable manner, to edge themselves in. Elizabeth turned round in haughty surprise, Margaret in childish wonder, and presented to the eyes of the eager officers, two of the loveliest faces on the race course.
"Oh!" said one of these cavaliers to the other, drawing back with a very blank and crest-fallen face, "Oh! I didn't know they were young uns!"
Margaret could hardly restrain her laughter at this audible ejaculation. Miss Gage contented herself by thanking Heaven with a curved lip, that they were soldiers.
"No sailor," she said to Margaret, "would ever annoy a woman, young or old. I am glad they were rude, these dragoons!"
The contempt with which this last word was pronounced, all the keener for its calmness, can scarcely be imagined.
"But I ought to apologise to you, dear," she continued; "though to suppose that your brave father had the most distant affinity to these popinjays, would be indeed too insulting."
Presently the race began, and Margaret forgot all about the rudeness of the officers in the interest of the scene.