knowledge of a man, and the
one-sided ardour of a woman. She had already cheered herself hoarse;
but still kept up a running fire of comment, emphasised by an
occasional pressure of the Colonel's coat-sleeve, to the acute
discomfiture of that self-contained Scot.

"We'll not be far off the winning post now," she assured him at this
juncture. "Our ponies are playing with their heads entirely, and the
others are losing theirs because of the natives and the cheering.
There goes the ball straight for the boundary again!--Well done,
Geoff! But the long fellow's caught it--Saints alive! 'Twould have
been a goal but for Theo. How's _that_ for a fine stroke, now?"

For Desmond, with a clean, splitting smack, had sent the ball flying
across three-fourths of the ground.

"Mind the goal!" he shouted to his half-back, Alla Dad Khan, as
Diamond headed after the ball like a lightning streak, with three
racers--maddened by whip and spur and their own delirious
excitement--clattering upon his tail; and a fusilade of clapping,
cheers, and yells broke out on all sides.

The ball, checked in mid career, came spinning back to them with the
force of a rifle-bullet. The speed had been terrific, and the wrench
of pulling up wrought dire confusion. Followed a sharp scrimmage, a
bewildering jumble of horses and men, rattling of sticks and
unlimited breaking of the third commandment; till the ball shot out
again into the open, skimming, like a live thing, through a haze of
fine white dust, Desmond close upon it, as before; the Hussar
"forwards" in hot pursuit.

But their "back" was ready to receive the ball, and Desmond along with
it. Both players struck simultaneously. Their cane-handled sticks met
with a crack that was heard all over the ground. Then the ball leapt
clean through the goal-posts, the head of Desmond's stick leapt after
it, and the crowd scattered right and left before a thundering onrush
of ponies. Cheer upon cheer, yell upon yell, went up from eight
thousand throats at once. British soldiers flung their helmets in the
air; the band lost its head and broke into a triumphant clash of
discord; while Colonel Buchanan, forgetful of his Scottish decorum,
stood up in the drag and shouted like any subaltern.

He was down in the thick of the _melee_, ready to greet Desmond as he
rode off the battlefield, a breathless unsightly victor, covered with
dust and glory.

"Stunningly played--the whole lot of you!"

"Thank you, sir. G