She blushed to the very roots of her hair—why she would have been at a loss to explain,—crumpled her race-card into a hundred creases, and observed innocently—
"Why should it make any difference now? Do ye think we'd like you better for being a hundred times a winner? I wouldn't then, for one!"
He was sitting very close, and nobody but herself heard the whisper, in which he asked—
"Then you don't despise a fellow for losing, Miss Macormac, do you?"
"Despise him?" she answered with flashing eyes. "Never say the word! If I liked him before, d'ye think I wouldn't like him ten times better after he'd been vexed by such a disappointment as that! Ye're not understanding what I mean, and maybe I'm not putting it into right words, but it seems to me——Yes, dear mamma, I'm minding what you say! Sure enough, it is raining in here fit to drown a fish! I'm obliged to ye, Captain. Will ye kindly shift the cloak and cushions to that dry place yonder by Lady Mary. How wet the poor riders will be in their silk jackets! I'm pleased and thankful now—indeed I am—that ye're sheltered safe and dry in the stand."
The last remark in a whisper, because of Lady Mary's supervision, who thinking the tête-à-tête between Daisy and her daughter had lasted long enough, took advantage of a driving shower and the state of the roof to call pretty Miss Norah into a part of the stand which she considered in every respect more secure.
The sky had again darkened, the afternoon promised to be wet. Punchestown weather is not proverbial for sunshine, and Mrs. Lushington, who had done less execution than she considered rightly due to a new toilette of violet and swansdown, voted the whole thing a failure and a bore. The last race was run off in a pelting shower, the Lord Lieutenant's carriages and escort had departed, people gathered up their shawls and wrappings with little interest in anything but the preservation of dry skins. Ladies yawned and began to look tired, gentlemen picked their way through the course ankle-deep in mud, to order up their several vehicles, horse and foot scattered themselves over the country in every direction from a common centre, the canvas booths flapped, wind blew, the rain fell, the great day's racing was over, and it was time to go home.
Norah Macormac's ears were very sharp, but they listened in vain for the expected invitation from Lady Mary, asking Daisy to spend a few days with them at the castle. Papa, whose hospitality was unbounded and uncontrollable, would have taken no denial, under any circumstances; but papa was engaged with the race committee, and intended, moreover, to gallop home across country by himself. There seemed nothing for it but to put as much cordiality into her farewell as was compatible with the presence of bystanders and the usages of society.
Miss Norah no doubt acquitted herself to Daisy's satisfaction—and her own.
Mr. Sullivan, whose experience enabled him to recover his losses on the great handicap by a judicious selection of winners in two succeeding races, did not, therefore, depart without a final glass of comfort, which he swallowed in company with the Roscommon farmer. To him he expounded his views on steeple-chasing, and horses in general, at far greater length than in the forenoon. It is a matter of regret that, owing to excitement, vexation, and very strong punch, Denis should have been much too drunk to understand a word he said. The only idea this worthy seemed clearly to take in, he repeated over and over again in varying tones of grief and astonishment, but always in the same terms:—