There was no pretence of outside civility between the two young men now. Bertha heard part of the story from both parties, but with neither would she take sides; only from that time forward she declined to drive out with either of them.
Alec was fast coming to the front in the business he had chosen, and was already talking of being proposed for Tattersall’s; but while his income rose, so did his spending. He had no thought of saving money, bit by bit, to make his pile. It must be done by some great coup, that was his only plan.
Huey also prospered, but his takings were never very great, and of this the larger part was put aside; for, despite the assurance of Soft Sam that the number of mugs was unlimited, Huey felt the time would come when they must run short.
The first time Alec entered the mare he had to name her, and as Bertha she ran almost last in a selling race at Rosehill; not quite last though, for there was a black horse behind her named, a queer name Alec thought, The Vengeance, and entered in a name new to the turf.
For it was Huey’s horse, and he had chosen a friend at Richmond as nominal owner.
And in the months that went by these two horses often met again, and once at Warwick Farm in a Birthday Handicap, in which the field was so moderate or so “stiff” that Bertha’s jockey, in spite of the order that she was only out for an airing, could not keep her back, she pushed to the front and made a dead heat of it with The Vengeance, who was being pulled hard at the post, and nearly got disqualified in consequence.
On the whole, the two young owners were highly satisfied with their investments. They knew from repeated trials that their animals were pounds and pounds better than the cattle they allowed week after week to beat them. At the same time, Sam warned them that there were several others, at the same game as themselves, all entered to get the weight lowered, all waiting for the one event of their lives, when their true form should be publicly shown—and their value as racers gone for ever.
Alec already counted his great coup as good as accomplished; if not this season, then certainly the next. The Sydney Cup should be his, and with it the hand of Bertha Summerhayes.
Huey heard him boast so one day to Soft Sam, and glared at him viciously as he walked away, muttering to himself—
“No, you traitor and bully! The Cup is not yours yet, nor Bertha either! The Vengeance is mine, and at any cost he shall be truly named?”