was his friend's turn this
time.

"Not me," Jerry replied. "No scrappin' Sunday. Miss Boy's orders."

Albert, very white, was sparring all round his adversary's head.

"Chukkered me, did ye?" he said. "Put 'em up then, or I'll spoil ye."

The offence was the unforgiveable in the Putnam stable, and the watching
lads had every hope of a battle royal when a calm, deep voice stilled
the storm.

"That'll do," it said.

The real Boy entered.

The dark blue of her dress showed off her fair colouring and hair.

She was nearly twenty-one now and spiritually a woman, if she still
retained the slight, sword-like figure of her girlhood days. Her face
was graver than of old and more quiet. The touch of almost aggressive
resolution and defiance it once possessed had shaded off into something
stiller and more impressive. There was less show of strength and more
evidence of it. Her roots were deeper, and she was therefore less moved
by passing winds. Something of her mother's calm had invaded her. She
got her way just as of old, but she no longer had to battle for it now
as then. Or if she had to battle, the fight was invisible, and the
victory fought and won in the unseen deeps of her being.

"Who's been smoking here?" the girl asked immediately on entering the
barn.

"Me, Miss," said Jerry.

Monkey Brand was fond of affirming that on the whole the lads told the
truth to Miss Boy. But whether it was the girl's personality or her
horsemanship that accounted for this departure from established rule it
was hard to surmise.

"You might leave that to Jaggers's lads," said the girl. "Surely we
might keep this one hour in the week clean."

Mr. Haggard had once said that the girl was a Greek. He might have
added--a Greek with an evangelical tendency. For this Sunday morning
hour was no perfunctory exercise for her. It was a reality, looming
always larger with the years, and on horseback, in the train, at
stables, was perpetually recurring to the girl throughout the week.

In the struggle between her father and her mother in her blood, the
mother was winning the ascendancy.

"I thought the rule was we might smoke if you was late, Miss," said
Jerry, in the subdued voice he always adopted when speaking to his young
mistress.

"It's not the rule, Jerry," the girl replied quietly, "as you're
perfectly well aware. And even if it was the rule it would be bad
manners. Alfred, give me those cards."

"What cards, Miss?"

"The