He talked mainly about the stud, interesting her in a subject which she had never before viewed at close quarters. He described various events in which some of his charges had won distinction, and presently, to Bunny's keen delight; he began a brief but stirring description of an attempt to tamp with one of the animals two summers before on the eve of one of the Graydown Races. Some inkling of the intended attempt had reached him, and he himself had lain in wait to frustrate it.
"But how?" cried Bunny breathlessly.
"I decided to spend the night in the loose-box," said Jake. "There's no hardship in sleeping alongside a good horse. I've done it many a time. I wasn't so intimate with Lord Saltash then as I am now, but I knew enough not to be altogether surprised when he came sliding into the stable-yard a little after midnight in a two-seated car and made straight for the loose-box where I was. The top half of the door was ajar, and there was a dim lamp burning in the yard, but his head-lights showed up everything like day. He pushed the top half right back and leaned his arms on the lower and said, 'That you, Bolton?' I got up and went to him. There was no one else about. 'I've put myself in charge this trip,' I told him. 'You needn't be nervous.' He grinned in a sickly sort of fashion and said, 'I am nervous-deuced nervous, and I'll tell you why. If that brute runs to-morrow I'm a ruined man.' And then he started jawing about some fool wager he'd made, said he was under the thumb of some rascally booky, and actually began to try and talk me into spoiling the animal's chances."
Jake paused. He was looking at Maud as if he expected something.
She looked back at him, her head very high, her eyes shining defiantly bright. "Lord Saltash has a double apparently?" she said.
"Now, that's real clever of you!" said Jake, with a smile. "Yes, that is the key to the mystery, and I soon grasped it. He offered me a large sum of money to prevent Pedro running. Pedro was listening to the transaction with his head on my shoulder. I said yes to everything, and then I suggested that we should settle the details outside where there was no chance of witnesses. He agreed to that, and I picked up my whip and got into his car after him, and we slipped out and ran about half-a-mile into the Park where I stopped him."
Jake paused again, still looking expectantly at the girl facing him. She was flushed but evidently not greatly moved.
"What a thrilling recital!" she said.
And, "Go on!" urged Bunny impatiently.
Jake laughed a little. "I felt rather a skunk myself. He was so sweetly unsuspicious, till I used the cowboy clutch on him and tied up his arms in his own coat. That opened his eyes, but it was a bit too late. He was in for a cowhiding, and he realized it, scarcely showed fight, in fact. I didn't let him off on that account, and I don't suppose he has forgotten it to this day. I didn't quite flay him, but I made him feel some."
"And you let him go afterwards?" questioned Bunny.
"Yes, I let him go." Jake took up his cup and drank in a contemplative fashion. "After that," he said, in his slow way, "I went back to Pedro, and we finished the night together. But-I don't know whether having his rest disturbed upset his nerves any-he only managed to come in second after all."
"And Lord Saltash?" said Maud abruptly. "Did you ever tell him what had happened?"
"Oh yes," said Jake. "I told him the following evening, and he laughed in his jolly way and said, 'Well, I'm glad you weren't taken in, but I'm glad too that you let the poor devil go. A leathering from you couldn't have been any such joke.' It wasn't," added Jake grimly. "It was as unlike a joke as a blue pill is unlike raspberry jam."
"But what became of the real man?" questioned Bunny. "Did he get clean away?"
"Clean away," said Jake. "And now-if you're ready-we'll go and see the hero of that episode."
"Who was the hero?" asked Maud, with a hint of sarcasm as she rose.
He looked at her with a faint smile. "Why, Dom Pedro, of course," he said. "Come along and make his acquaintance!"
CHAPTER X
THE HEAD OF THE FAMILY
It was among the horses that Maud at length saw Jake Bolton in his true element. They were all plainly very dear to his heart. He introduced them as friends. His pockets were stuffed with sugar which both she and Bunny helped to distribute, and not till dusk came upon them did they realize the lateness of the hour.
It was at the last minute that Jake suddenly summoned a little man who was lounging in the gateway. "Here, Sam! I've been telling the lady about your tumble and how they put you together again. It interested her."
Sam approached with a sheepish grin. "I thought I was a goner," he said. "But Mr. Bolton-" he looked at Jake and his grin widened-"he's one of the Never-say-die sort. And the Yankee doctor, well, he was a regular knock-out, he was. Mended me as clean-well, there, you wouldn't never have known I'd had a smash."
One eye wandered down to Bunny in his long chair as he spoke; but he discreetly refrained from comment, and it was Bunny who eagerly broke in with: "What happened to you? Was it your spine? Let's hear!"
Sam was only too willing to oblige. He settled down to his story like a horse into its stride, and for nearly a quarter of an hour Maud stood listening to the account of the miracle which, according to Sam Vickers, the great American doctor had performed.
Bunny drank it all in with feverish avidity. Maud did not like to watch his face. The look it wore went to her heart.
She did not want to glance at Jake either though after a time she felt impelled to do so. His eyes were fixed upon Bunny, but on the instant they came straight to hers as if she had spoken. She avoided them instinctively, but she felt them none the less, as though a dazzling searchlight had suddenly and mercilessly been turned upon her, piercing straight to her soul.
It was soon after this that he quietly intervened to put an end to Sam's reminiscences. It was growing late, and they ought to be moving.
Maud agreed; Bunny protested, and was calmly overruled by Jake. They started back through a pearly greyness of dusk that heralded the rising of the moon. They spoke but little as they went. Bunny seemed suddenly tired, and it did not apparently occur to either of his companions to attempt to make conversation.
Only, as they descended the winding road that led down to Fairharbour and a sudden clamour of church-bells arose through the evening mist, Jake glanced again at the girl who was walking rather wearily by Bunny's side, and said, "Wouldn't you like to go to Church now? I'll see to the youngster."
She shook her head. "Thank you very much; I don't think so."
"Oh, go on, Maud!" exclaimed Bunny, emerging from his reverie. "I don't want you if Jake will stay. I'd sooner have Jake. He doesn't fuss like you."
"I'll get him to bed," Jake went on, as if he had not spoken. "You can trust me to do that, you know. I won't let him talk too much either. Say, Miss Brian, it's a good offer; you'd better close with it."
She heard the smile in the words; and because of it she found she could not refuse. "But I don't like to give you so much trouble," she said.
"You give me pleasure," he answered simply.
At the gate of the churchyard he stopped. "I'll say good-bye," he said. "But don't hurry back! I shall stay as long as I am wanted."
She knew that she could rely upon him in that respect as upon no one else in the world. She gave him her hand with another low word of thanks.
"May I walk to the door with you?" he said, and drew Bunny's chair to one side.
It would have been churlish to refuse. She suffered him in silence.
The church was on an eminence that overlooked the harbour. Reaching the porch, the whole wide view of open sea lay spread before them, flooded in moonlight. The clanging bells above them had sunk to stillness. A peace that seemed unearthly wrapped them round. They stood for the moment quite alone, gazing out to the far, dim sky-line.
And suddenly Maud heard the beating of her heart in the silence, and was conscious of an overwhelming