"Is he your husband?" Gay asked, laughing. "I knew you were married, dear Min, but I didn't know your husband's name. Do introduce me."
"Of course I will, miss, and feel honoured," Min replied proudly.
Soon after, she waved to her husband as he walked back along the course; he handed over his horse and sulky to a lad walking with him, and ducking under the rails, made his way to his wife, Min fairly beamed with pride as she said:
"Well done, Bob! What was the time?"
Bob gave it, hugely gratified, though glancing curiously at Gay, as she sat smiling bewitchingly down on him.
"This is me husband, miss," Min said affectionately. "Mr. Bob Toplady, Miss Lawless."
Gay held out her hand to the big, jolly man.
"How do you do?" she said. "I am so pleased you won that heat, and I'm so glad, too, to see dear Min again."
"Thank you, miss," said Bob, rapidly recovering his equanimity under Gay's unaffected enthusiasm. "I thought I was caught just close home, but when I saw the other break, I knew it was all my own. Not that his breaking was enough to disqualify him, you know, miss," he explained; "he didn't do enough for that, but because I've raced with that horse before, and I knew he was a bad breaker."
Gay listened with all her ears, though Bob's arguments did not seem conclusive. Still, she thought, there's plenty of time to learn, and she would remember that, and ask Carlton Mackrell.