egan to pitch odd screws and bolts at your car--he was never angry
for a moment, just playing, as you were. But she was all excited over
losing; when she saw he had both hands busy and you were forcing them
back again, she snatched something out of the open box Corrie had got
the bolts from and threw it at you, herself. She didn't know what she
had thrown or done, until she saw you fall stunned across your
steering-wheel and your car plunge off the road."

"I might have known," said Gerard, and turned his face to the course he
did not see.

"_You_ might have known!" flared Mr. Rose. "What was the matter with
_me_? Hadn't I lived with Corwin B. Rose since he was born and never had
seen him cheat or play foul, win or lose? He was straight, always. I
should have known when he wouldn't talk--he never was afraid to speak
out and take his licking. Oh yes, I belong to the brutal common people
and Corrie wasn't brought up by moral suasion; he had more than one
flogging before he was fourteen and we called him a man. And he never
lied to dodge one. I went back on him; he never did on me."

The gay tumult of the tensely-strung multitude was in their ears, the
band-music crashed blatant aid to the excitement. With a humming purr
and rush the Mercury car shot past again, followed by the long roll of
applause.

"We're leading by a minute and a half," one of Gerard's men triumphed,
running past on some errand. "Oh you Rosie!"

"He stopped his machine as soon as he could, and put Isabel out," Mr.
Rose continued sombrely. "She says herself that she was scared sick and
begged him to save her. I can guess that part. Anyhow, he told her to go
home and say nothing, that he would take care of her. He did. If it
hadn't been for your protecting him, that morning, he might have ended
in State's prison. I don't suppose she would ever have cleared him if
she hadn't fallen in love with one of those Southerners she has been
visiting, and blurted out the truth when he proposed, the other day. He
put her in a buggy, drove over to the nearest clergyman, and married
her then and there; then gave her paper and pen and made her write the
whole story to me. He is a gentleman; he'd stand with her for whatever
she had done, but he would not stand for her leaving Corrie to bear her
blame. I'll make it up to him, yet!"

"Does Flavia know?" Gerard asked.

"I gave her Isabel's letter on the way across to you."

Flavia was sitting in the car with her w