"Mr. Reynolds has won the victory to-day," he said, "and under the ancient rules has the right to choose where he will have the crown rest. You wear it like a queen."
There was something behind his light manner and lighter words that touched her. She did not rightly construe him, guessing that he was simply striving to hide the chagrin of his first defeat in the field.
"Victor to-day, vanquished to-morrow," was her quick rejoinder; "there is a good deal of mere chance in such things, I suppose. No doubt to-day was one of your unlucky days."
"Yes, but I must admit that I never have equaled Mr. Reynolds' score of this morning, so I can not get any comfort out of your gracious suggestion," he frankly exclaimed. "He is a better shot than I—the best I ever saw."
"My uncle says so too," she responded, "and he is enthusiastic about the dog, the one that did the fine act."
"Superb, superb!" he rejoined with emphasis. "I would put that dog against the whole world of dogs." He found a sort of comfort in praising his rival and his rival's dog. It was a species of self-torture that deadened for the time the pain of his defeat.
Miss Beresford, who was so situated that she could not avoid hearing this conversation, glanced at her brother with a repressed resentment in her eyes. She felt that he was not doing himself justice; that he was, in fact, failing to assert himself as a true Beresford, a name that had never before tamely accepted and acknowledged defeat.
"Give me your score, Mr. Beresford, please," said Miss Crabb, coming forward with her book and pencil.
"Thirty-three," he promptly answered. His sister's face flushed with anger. She turned to him and said under her breath:
"She shall not do that—she shall not publish it!"