gh and care is on a vacation.
They were experiencing that keenest of pleasures--joy in the _present_.

They watched London Society equestrianising for the admiration of the
less washed, who were gazing from chairs and benches, trying to tell
from their appearance which was a duke and which merely 'mister'--and
usually guessing quite wrongly. Ladies of title, some of them riding
so badly that their steeds were goaded into foam by the incessant pull
of the curb bit, trotted past young ladies and gentlemen with
note-books, who had been sent by an eager Press to record the
activities of the truly great. Handsome women rode in the Row with
their children mounted on wiry ponies (always a charming sight); and
middle-aged, angular females, wearing the customary riding-hat which
reduces beauty to plainness and plainness to caricature, rode
melancholy quadrupeds, determined to do that which is done by those who
are of consequence in the world.

But pleasures born of the passing hour, unlike those of the past or of
anticipation, end with the striking of the clock. It seemed to Austin
Selwyn that they had been riding only for the space of minutes, when
Elise asked him the time.

'It is twenty minutes to one,' he said. 'I had no idea time had passed
so quickly.'

'Nor I,' she answered. 'Just one more canter, and then we'll go.'

The eager horses chafed at their bits, and pleaded, after the manner of
their kind, to be allowed one mad gallop with heaving flanks and
snorting triumph at the end; but decorum forbade, and contenting
themselves with the agreeable counterfeit, Selwyn and the girl
reluctantly turned from the Park towards home.

The expressionless Smith was waiting for them, and looked at the two
horses with that peculiar intolerance towards their riders which the
very best groom in the world cannot refrain from showing.

'Won't you come in and take the chance of what there is for lunch?' she
said as Selwyn helped her to dismount.

'N-no, thanks,' he said.

She pouted, or pretended to. 'Now, why?' she said as Smith mounted the
chestnut, and touching his hat, walked the horses away.

'There is no reason,' he said, smiling, 'except---- Look here; will
you come downtown and have dinner with me to-night?'

'You Americans are refreshing,' she said, burrowing the toe of her
riding-boot with the point of the crop, 'As a matter of fact, I have to
go to dinner to-night at Lady Chisworth's.'

'Then have a headache