Chapter XXI: Aunt Lavinia

Unhappy about Chris, worried at Carlton's self-expatriation, and deeply dissatisfied with her sporting experiment, Gay got into the way of going much oftener to the little South Street house than usual; she even accompanied Aunt Lavinia on some of her secret charitable errands, and found her own troubles recede to very trumpery affairs indeed, in the light of the real tragedy of the poor that underlies all, especially town life.

She began to question her right to waste money as she did on Trotting and otherwise, and her ambitions seemed puerile, even common, as contrasted with those of this dear little lady, who was always sowing as flowers in the King's garden, the loving thoughts, the helpful deeds, that unlike earthly flowers, would never fade. And as Lavinia was growing old, and time was short, she sowed as hard as she could, and unhappy, selfish people looking at her, always busy, always happy, wondered what her secret was--Lossie would never learn it, but Gay perhaps got some inkling in those visits to the poor, where her bright face and warm heart served her well.

It came as a great surprise to her to find that Chris, who in an unobtrusive way helped his less fortunate brothers of the pigskin far more than he could afford, assisted many poor people through Aunt Lavinia, and while she knew that racing men are proverbially generous, not to say princely, in their charities, she was greatly pleased at this new light on his character.

"Chris has the loveliest disposition, and the tenderest heart in the world, my dear--it's as big as an ox's," said Lavinia one day, when she and Gay were returning from a visit where they had poured sympathy into a bereaved creature's bleeding heart, and incidentally food and firing into her larder and cellar. "Carlton Mackrell hasn't--and it's such a pity, as he's so rich, and could help so much--but that's how it always is in this world, and always will be."

Gay turned her head aside to hide a blush of pleasure, for praise of Chris was very sweet to her--indeed, he was so constantly in her thoughts, that the merest shake brought his name to her lips.

"He's always doing something kind to somebody--except me," she said. "He knows it breaks my heart for him to ride, and he will do it."

"Poor boy," said Aunt Lavinia, and sighed, "he can't help it. That passion for horses is in the blood of his family. You can spill it if you like, but you can't get it out."

"But it's rough on other people," cried Gay. "Chris gets all the fun, and those who love him the sorrow."

"So you _do_ love him, Gay?" said Aunt Lavinia, who for all her goodness had on occasion a most unsaintly twinkle in her eye, as at that moment.

"Auntie, _who_ would love a man who keeps your heart in your mouth, and always--always in a drivelling state of terror that he'll be brought home to you in pieces, just alive in the biggest piece? I have a feeling that the mere thought that _I expect_ him to have an accident every time, will bring about one! I'd rather be an old maid (I should never make a delightful one like you) and dry-nurse Heron for the rest of my life, than live in such a purgatory of hopes and fears."

"Well, Gay," said Aunt Lavinia, "he would die in the way he liked, wouldn't he? And real love consists, not in making others do what we like, but in wanting them to be happy, so long as it is in no disgraceful way, let us suffer what we may. I hate racing, as you know--but then I don't like your Trotting at all either, my dear"--and shook her head, Gay was on the wrong tack, but only going through the mill would set her on the right one.

Gay sighed. She had long ago found that Trotting, like marriage, "takes a lot of kidding," and the less she enjoyed it, the more she "kidded," but not to herself, being by now very sick of the fad that she had so light-heartedly taken up.

The horses themselves, the actual racing part, still appealed to her; she thought their action the prettiest possible sight, and never lost her pleasure in seeing them go--loved a close finish--it was the surroundings that disgusted her.

"Anyway, my fad is not dangerous to life--like Chris's," she said, then suddenly remembered the ugly fall she had witnessed from the tiny perch on Rensslaer's borrowed sulky, and the life-long injury to the back that ensued.

"Are you not both a little selfish, my dear?" said Lavinia. "Laddie, (her pet-name for Chris) won't give up his racing, nor you your trotting--but there is more reason in his asking the sacrifice from you, than your demanding it from him. His mother did not."

"Oh!" cried Gay passionately, "knowing what it must have cost her, how could he do it?"

"I believe there is a special Heaven to which good sons go," said Lavinia, softly putting the question by. "I don't say good mothers--that's natural--but to be a perfect son, and yet to be a man at all points--a man of the world even--like Chris--that's rare--rare and most beautiful."

Then Lavinia confided to Gay with a blush that the only reason she ever regretted not having married--and at times she regretted it intensely--was because she wanted a son--a son like Chris.

"You and his mother were great friends," said Gay very gently.

"Yes--if either of them could have any real friend but each other. They made the most delightful pair. Whenever you met them--and they were never apart except when he was racing--they were having no end of a good time, and cutting jokes together--what one said, the other thought, and it was always amusing. I remember her talking one day to Chris about something she would do 'when she was old and respectable,' and he said, 'you'll never be old, and you'll never be respectable,' and they both roared--it was a treat to see them together."

"He will never think any other woman fit to tie her shoe-string," said Gay.

"Oh," cried Lavinia, "she was by no means perfect! 'Chris loves me for what I might have been--not for what I am,' she said to me one day. But cheer up, Gay, the dear boy will put on weight, and settle down quietly, and ride to hounds like any other country gentleman, once you are married."

But Gay could not see Chris jogging to hounds on a weight-carrier, and she worried a good deal in a quiet way. The world said there was nothing like taking up a man's pursuits to rub the bloom off a girl's face, and being so famous--or notorious--had by no means improved her.

Something of her snap and freshness had departed, and Min Toplady, who occasionally saw her at Meetings, observed with much concern that her young lady had grown thinner, quieter, that the radiant girl who had gone to Inigo Court with Chris, to applaud Carlton Mackrell when he won, had vanished, seemingly never to return. Min wished that gentleman would come home, persuade Gay to marry him, and settle down in the country as a sporting squire, with her for the Lady Bountiful that Nature had plainly cut her out to be. Of course Mr. Chris was a dangerous rival, but neither rich like the other, nor desirable as a husband, from the habit he had of risking his neck whenever he got a chance. And Min did not think Miss Gay would elect to live with her heart in her mouth for at least six months out of every year, so that the betting was at least even on Carlton Mackrell. Of course, _that_ Miss Lossie was always waiting to cut in, and get the latter for herself, but, as Min vulgarly expressed it in her own mind, he wasn't taking any.

Fortunately the Professor did not worry Gay, for as if to make up for wasted time, and terrified of meeting Lossie, he had disappeared among his microscopes and tubes, and burrowed there. He seemed, as Gay expressed it, to be chewing the cud of ticklish experiments that wouldn't come off, and when he went down to see Chris, he did not offer to take her, nor did she propose to accompany him, for even while her heart yearned over the boy, she felt for him a curious anger, realising all that his love of steeplechasing cost her.

He also was having by no means a rosy time, either in body or mind, for by careful editing, she was made to furnish spicy tit-bits to the newspapers, and he raged at the accident that had put him out of the running in more ways than one, just when Gay had never so badly wanted all her friends.

Brusher Tugwood's disgust at Carlton Mackrell's expulsion had been deep and bitter. He always persisted in it that private spite was at the bottom of the affair, that his master had been too successful in beating the public-house pacers, and he also resented Gay's lukewarm interest in the sport she had taken up so keenly, and blamed her for not interesting Rensslaer in it to some practical purpose.

But now, to all lovers of horses, a new topic had arisen. There had begun to loom up in the public view, a forthcoming International Horse Show at Olympia, that was to eclipse anything of the kind ever before seen in England.

At first women took but a languid interest in it, and if anyone had predicted that all London would literally besiege the historic hall to catch a glimpse of the wonderful arena, and the brilliant equine contests conducted therein, he would have been laughed out of court. But when a whisper flew round that it was to be _the_ big social event of the season, that the King and Queen were going, and it would be a place for one's very smartest frock and hat, also that at least six millionaires had entered the pick of their studs, and over two thousand entries were already made, public attention awoke; everywhere horses, and the sumptuous surroundings they were to have, became the principal topic of conversation.

It seemed that although Great Britain had all the time been the premier horse-breeding country of the world, it was only now that Englishmen in general had awakened to the fact--strange in a horse-breeding nation, that had for one and a half centuries, prided itself upon its devotion to, and its pre-eminence in, this all-important matter!

It was a surprise to Gay to find that Rensslaer took so much interest in it, for she knew him to be a rather severe critic of horse shows in general (he excepted shows such as Richmond, etc.), his criticisms being based on firm foundations, but she quickly discovered how completely his heart was in it, when he discussed animatedly with her the scope of the idea.

"You see," he said, "in England hitherto a horse show has been designed solely for horsey people--for those who desire to buy and sell; the scene is gloomy, and in consequence the spectators consist almost entirely of men, only the horsiest women attending them."

"_I_ know," said Gay, making a little face, for she had attended one with enthusiastic Chris--to her sorrow.

"The curious thing is," went on Rensslaer, "that though horse shows undoubtedly originated in England, starting with classes for young breeding stock at the agricultural shows as early as 1840, the development of this idea is undoubtedly due to a book--Mr. Samuel Sidney's 'Book of the Horse.' From that time the movement spread in Europe, America, and the Colonies, and the International view was taken up by foreign supporters of horse shows, who held them in Paris, Berlin, Brussels, The Hague, Chicago, and New York."

"Especially New York," said Gay. "Is it true that the Madison Square Gardens Horse Show sets the American fashion for the year?"

"Yes--the public goes to view the show, but the show that it views is in the boxes, not the ring. The horses? Oh! there are some very fine horses shown, and the papers devote a quarter of a column or so to describing them. But it's a good thing all the same."

"It's time we 'bucked up,' for England was dropping behind a bit," said Gay confidentially. "But what can you expect with Free Trade, and the present Government?"

Rensslaer laughed.

"She won't be behind this time. No such show will ever have been held in England. The great point is, that the thing has been so conceived that the most unintelligent mind on horsey affairs may be thoroughly interested. In those details where every other horse show usually bores, because of tedious routine, this one will appeal to the expert, and non-expert, and if you'll contrast jumps made of real turf, with the way other shows are done, with bare boards and dirty hurdles as the enclosure of the ring, you'll see the improvement. Then the natural disappointment among foreign visitors that there are no English gentlemen of the same class to ride against, is being met--no grooms will be seen in the ring, and a great effort is being made to get English officers themselves to ride."

"Of course it is a move in the right direction that gentlemen in appropriate costume should ride the jumpers, and not dirty stable-boys in hobnailed boots," said Gay, thinking of how Chris would have _loved_ to ride, and how delightful he would have looked.

"It's astonishing how much better a gentleman sits, and in how much better form he rides," said Rensslaer, "so that the moment he commences riding, you can tell he is one."

Gay nodded; she had often remarked it.

"We hope to have picked out the best features of every International Horse Show," said Rensslaer. "The system of having appointment classes, will spare the public the ugly sight of seeing horses driven in quite inappropriate carriages, such as a fat hackney in an American speed wagon, and so on, thus a great impetus will be given to the carriage trade. Then there will be the ladies' 'George the Fourth' phaeton class, a low two-horse carriage with a seat for a servant behind, which is the proper carriage for ladies driving, instead of a high dogcart, or any two-wheeled carriage, which is only fit for a publican's wife out on a bank holiday."

"Or a Trotting Meeting," said Gay slyly.

He laughed.

"There is no doubt," he said, "that the show will do good, not only by welding the forces of breeders, exhibitors, and dealers together, but also by encouraging the breeding of the best type of the English horse, and thus help to remove one of the most serious objections to automobilism--the fear that it will result in the ultimate extinction of the horse. It will be the finest display of horse-flesh and of horsemanship that has ever been seen on so gigantic a scale in England, or perhaps even in the world."

"I hope we are all right!" exclaimed Gay, jealous for her mother-country.

"Well," said Rensslaer, "though the competition of America and the Continent will be strong, and meet with a certain amount of success, I think the English exhibitors will hold their own, and from whatever country the winners come, it is always the English strain that wins, though the fact is possibly more obvious to the foreigner than to ourselves. I want you and the Professor to come to Elsinore one day, and see what I am sending--"

But Gay declared this to be impossible; her brother had completely withdrawn into his scientific shell, and to dislodge him was impossible. Besides, Rensslaer had delayed so long in inviting them, a little to her surprise, that now she felt in no particular hurry to go, and he did not press the point. It was only later that she discovered in his apparent inhospitality, but another instance of Rensslaer's fine tact, how it was not until he knew her to be finally disgusted with Trotting as a sport, that he showed her the real thing, the game as it should be played, such Trotters as she had never dreamed of.

It would be hard to say why Rensslaer, in whose life women had no place, (though he had his own romance hidden away, as Gay had always suspected), took so much interest in the girl, gave her so much precious time, when in his many-sided life, and the multiplicity and engrossing interest of his hobbies, he had none to spare for his old friends, much less for society, which he despised.

But he liked her sporting spirit when first he saw her at Inigo Court, pitied her for the disillusion that her Trotting passion was bound to bring her, admired her pluck when things went wrong, found her true-hearted, honest and kind, therefore after his own heart.

Yet when he went presently away, he somewhat sadly thought of the careless, happy girl, enthusing about her Trotters, whom he had found on his first visit. Unconsciously he murmured to himself:

"Give her back her youth again,
Let her be as she was then!
Let her wave her little hand
With its gesture of command...."

Yes, even the lightest bruise on youth, splendid, unbroken, unconscious even in its selfishness, was a pity.