n the morning of
the races. The dinner had gone off excellently. The dinner table, with
its softly shaded lamps, and the Doctor's arrangements of the flowers,
had been, she thought, perfection, and everything had passed off without
a hitch. Her duties as a hostess had been much lighter than she had
anticipated. Mrs. Hunter was a very pleasant, motherly woman, and the
girls, who had only come out from England four months before, were fresh
and unaffected, and the other people had all been pleasant and chatty.

Altogether, she felt that her first dinner party had been a great
success.

She was looking forward now with pleasant anticipation to the day. She
had seen but little of the natives so far, and she was now to see them
at their best. Then she had never been present at a race, and everything
would be new and exciting.

"Well, uncle, what time did you get in?" she asked, as she stepped out
into the veranda to meet him on his return from early parade. "It was
too bad of you and Mr. Hunter running off instead of waiting to chat
things over."

"I have no doubt you ladies did plenty of that, my dear."

"Indeed, we didn't, uncle; you see they had had a very long drive, and
Mrs. Hunter insisted on the girls going to bed directly you all went
out, and as I could not sit up by myself, I had to go too."

"We were in at half past twelve," the Major said. "I can stand a good
deal of smoke, but the club atmosphere was too thick for me."

"Everything went off very well yesterday, didn't it?" she asked.

"Very well, I thought, my dear, thanks to you and the Doctor and
Rumzan."

"I had very little to do with it," she laughed.

"Well, I don't think you had much to do with the absolute arrangements,
Isobel, but I thought you did very well as hostess; it seemed to me that
there was a good deal of laughing and fun at your end of the table."

"Yes; you see we had the two Miss Hunters and the Doctor there, and Mr.
Gregson, who took me in, turned out a very merry old gentleman."

"He would not be pleased if he heard you call him old, Isobel."

"Well, of course he is not absolutely old, but being a commissioner, and
all that sort of thing, gives one the idea of being old; but there are
the others."

And they went into the breakfast room.

The first race was set for two o'clock, and at half past one Mrs.
Hunter's carriage, with the four ladies, arrived at the inclosure. The
horses were taken out, and the carriage wheeled in