"Toes turned out, first position," said Lossie, watching Gay's face cruelly. "It was something to be thankful for, I suppose, that your feet weren't further apart than they were!"
Gay flushed.
She had thought only of bracing her toes hard against the foot-rests, not at all of how they looked. Had she looked immodest after all?
"Lucky you had no feathers in your hat," said Lossie with a sneer, and at that injustice to her invariably neat racing garb, Gay rebelled indignantly.
"Did you ever see me befeathered on a race-course?" she said contemptuously, but Lossie shrugged her shoulders.
"It looks as if you'd dressed for the part, and went down with the full intention of playing it," she said. "That rug, too, outlining you like a sheath—that was ready also, strange to say!"
"It was Mr. Rensslaer's," said Gay. "I suppose it was my fault that my driver got drunk, and someone had to be found at the last moment to take his place?"
"Mr. Rensslaer could have taken it, and would have done, if you'd let him—" And as this was true, Gay had no answer ready on that point.
"Anyway, I won it," she said, and tossed her pretty head, "that's the main thing."
"Because Carlton Mackrell let you," said Lossie. "Didn't you hear the crowd howling at him when he gave you the inside place? Or so a man told me who was watching the race through his glasses. Hark!"