Unfortunately the hobby had grown up with her. As
she was rich, influential, and very, very kind, most people were
content to count their early tea as well lost on her behalf.
Still, the necessity for hurriedly dropping the discussion of an
enthralling topic, and suppressing all mention of it during her
presence on the scene, was an affliction at a moment like the
present, when time was slipping away and indecision was the
prevailing note.
After a lunch-time of rather strangled and uneasy conversation,
Clovis managed to get most of the party together at the further
end of the kitchen gardens, on the pretext of admiring the
Himalayan pheasants. He had made an important discovery. Motkin,
the butler, who (as Clovis expressed it) had grown prematurely
grey in Lady Susan's service, added to his other excellent
qualities an intelligent interest in matters connected with the
Turf. On the subject of the forthcoming race he was not
illuminating, except in so far that he shared the prevailing
unwillingness to see a winner in Peradventure II. But where he
outshone all the members of the house-party was in the fact that
he had a second cousin who was head stable-lad at a neighbouring
racing establishment, and usually gifted with much inside
information as to private form and possibilities.
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