“Come on,” he exclaims, just a shade roughly to Lady Manderton. He has of late been, by the way, making up to her. She has got tired of Sir Arthur Muster-Day, and has shelved him for the “wicked earl,” by which name Lord Westray is known in Society circles. Mrs. Trevor, too, though she still sticks to Kil, and makes him believe that she is as devoted to him as ever, has managed to hook on to herself several other devoted swains, to all of whom in turn she expresses a mint of devotion, while really feeling not the slightest affection for any of them. She has played her part well, however, for they each severally believe themselves to be “the favoured man” in her good graces.
They gallop forward in the wake of Lord Westray, and Flora Desmond and Jack Delamere are once more alone.
“What a lovely woman!” she bursts out, as soon as they have passed Hector D’Estrange and Speranza. “Jack, did you ever see such eyes? I never saw lovelier, unless perhaps Hector D’Estrange’s. What a handsome pair the two make!”
“Well, yes, Florrie, she is certainly a lovely woman. Cunning dog, young Hector, to have kept her out of sight so long. Now we can understand why he is so cold to women. Of course that’s where his heart is, without doubt,” answers Jack Delamere, with a smile.
“The Melton Hunt Steeplechases of 1894 are over. The meeting will long be remembered by the unparalleled success of Mr. Hector D’Estrange, who, riding in the six races printed on the card for competition, came in first, the winner of every one of them. This success is all the more remarkable, inasmuch as four of the winners were non-favourites, so that the wins must be ascribed to the splendid horsemanship of their jockey. The feat is unparalleled, the nearest approach to it being when Captain ‘Doggie’ Smith in 1880 carried off all the races on the card except one, being defeated in a match which closed the day’s proceedings between Lord Hastings’ Memory, and Lord James Douglas’ The General. In this match ‘Doggie’ Smith rode Lord Hastings’ mare, and Lord James Douglas his own horse, The General.”
Such is the announcement chronicled in a well-known weekly sporting paper a few days after the Melton Hunt Steeplechases of 1894, scoring yet another triumph on the path of thoroughness for Hector D’Estrange.
CHAPTER IV.
“So you will not?”