"Oh, do find out what this is all about; who won that? what was it?
Ah, Captain Braybrooke, please come here and explain all this to me.
Why are they cheering?"
"That was the two hundred yard race over hurdles, Miss Chipchase. They are cheering the winner, Mr. Montague, our opponent, you know. It seems ever since Jim's name appeared in the 'All Army Cup' this morning, excitement has run high; you see, of course they know that Jim won the quarter of a mile race at Aldershot last year. It becomes a case of Rockcliffe versus Aldershot, and of course all the sympathies of Rockcliffe are with their own champion. I don't think, Miss Chipchase, they will throw things at us; but you mustn't expect Jim's victory to be received with enthusiasm. It's great fun to see the excitement his appearance in the lists has occasioned. It was looked upon as a foregone conclusion for Montague before; and though he is still favourite, they know now that he has not got it all his own way."
"Thank you so much," said Sylla, in her most dulcet tones. "And now, Captain Braybrooke, I want you to do me a great favour. It's of no use denying it, but I am an arrant gambler at heart; I must and will have a gamble on this. Will you please put five pounds for me on Captain Bloxam?" and as she spoke Sylla saw with infinite satisfaction that she had Lady Mary for an auditor.
"Certainly, Miss Chipchase," replied Braybrooke. "There can be no manner of difficulty about that. I have backed Jim myself, and you can stand in that much with my bets."
"Once more, thank you," replied Sylla; "and pray let Captain Bloxam know that the fortunes of all Todborough depend upon his exertions."
But Sylla made a great mistake if she thought that her making a bet on the result of this race would shock Lady Mary. The Ladies Ditchin had known what it was as girls to lose their quarter's allowance over one of their father's unlucky favourites for a big race; and Lady Mary all her life had been far too accustomed to regard backing an opinion as the strongest proof of sincere belief in it to feel in the least shocked at anybody holding similar views. She had indeed told her husband, as soon as the fact of her son being entered for this race came to her knowledge, that she must have her usual wager of ten pounds on the result. All the sporting instinct of her nature had been aroused, and Jim's entering the lists against the Rockcliffe champion had gone far to reconcile her to such an infringement of her programme as was involved in their attending the Rockcliffe games.
"Your brother is a good runner, I presume, Miss Bloxam?" inquired Lionel Beauchamp, who was sitting with Blanche on the other side of the marquee.
"Yes, Jim is fast and has won several 'gentlemen's' races. I don't want to brag, Mr. Beauchamp, but we Bloxams are all pretty good at those sort of things, and of course that's all as it should be with my brothers; but with us girls I don't know that it works quite so well. We can all dance, but we can none of us draw. We all play lawn tennis pretty well, but we can't play the piano; can all ride an awkward horse, but can neither sing a note in Italian nor any other language. And you—are you fond of any of these things? It is so difficult to tell what a man likes in London."
"Yes," rejoined Beauchamp, "in the London world we are wont to rave about matters we really don't care a rush about, to affect aesthetic tastes which we have not got, and the pretension to which entraps us into much foolish speaking. We go to all sorts of entertainments we don't care about, simply because other people go. You must not betray me, Miss Bloxam, but I declare I think one passes no pleasanter afternoon in London than when witnessing a good match at Lord's with a pleasant party on a warm day."
"Ah, we are all cricketers down here in Fernshire, boys and girls, men and women; we believe we invented the game, and in the old days stood pre-eminent in it. However, we now number so many disciples, and they have profited so much by our teaching that we are like the old man who,