Chapter XXII: King of the Road

Lossie, waiting in the tiny blue dining-room in South Street for Gay to fetch her, glanced round at the blue walls, the old copper prints, the bits of old Nankin, at the flowers on the table, blue also, and looking in the glass at those bluer flowers in her own head, felt a sudden nostalgia, a longing to have Carlton Mackrell beside her in her own _milieu_. It is what a woman in love always wants, and everyday her pain at the deprivation of Carlton's society became sharper, for there is no greater spendthrift in love than the selfish woman who has the full intention, _bien entendu_, of getting her own back, in one form or another.

Turning to the window, she saw Gay drive up, and cheerily wave her whip to her--that was the disgusting thing about Gay, that whether really happy, or only pretending, she always pluckily tried to live up to her name, thought Lossie, as she went out, pretending to herself that she was a mere cat's-paw, to be used or ignored by Gay as occasion served, but really glad of the opportunity of displaying her lovely clothes.

"Aunt Lavinia's slumming," said Lossie, in reply to the other's query, as she climbed to her perch. "Why don't you start a motor?" she grumbled. "This Ralli car is so selfish--you can't give your friends any sort of a time with it, or take them any distance. Nowadays one must either motor or be motored--and I prefer to do the motoring myself."

"Thank you," replied Gay with spirit, "I'm like Roosevelt--when someone asked him the other day when he was going to buy a motor-car, he said not while there were horses! I think it's just splendid," she added warmly, "for the Americans to come over here, and revive our rapidly waning interest in horses, and if some of our English millionaires spent their money in the same way, then so much the better would it be for horses, and for us! The horse is our friend even more than the dog, and I'd like to see him kept for enjoyment, not degraded to rough street work--_that's_ where the motor-car should come in!"

Lossie did not trouble to argue the point, she was better occupied in watching the effect of her beauty on the passers-by, and certainly the despised Ralli was very smartly turned out, as usual. The occasion, too, was pleasant, for they were on their way to see Mr. Vanderbilt's coach start from the Berkeley Hotel on its trial trip to Brighton, hence Gay's delight at the fillip given to coaching.

"You don't seem to have troubled much about your Trotters lately," said Lossie presently as they turned into Berkeley Square. "Yet here is poor Carlton hounded out of England, treated like any low welsher, because you fancied a wretched Gold Vase! I wonder you dare show your face at the Meetings as you do!"

"I shouldn't," said Gay with spirit, "if I had a face as sour as yours is at this moment! Really, Lossie, when I look at you, I feel thankful I wasn't born a beauty--it makes you leave everything else--manners, good temper, such lots of nice things, to chance, and the odds are forty to one!"

"Oh, we can't _all_ be a dear, artless little thing, truckling to men's brutal prejudices--one reason you are so popular with them is, because you pretend you don't want women to have the vote!" cried Lossie.

"Nor do I!" cried Gay warmly. "I consider an excited, shrieking crowd of sober women clamouring for their rights, more indecent than a crowd of men drunk who _don't_ clamour, and when it comes to slapping policemen's faces, padlocking themselves to railings, and rolling in gutters, it makes me ashamed of wearing a petticoat!"

"Brains never were your strong point, Gay," said Lossie comfortably, and Gay emphatically thanked Heaven they were _not_.

"The most rabid shrieker of them all would become mild as milk, if her own little baby were put in her arms, and she had her own man to love her," declared Gay. "And as there aren't enough men to go round, why don't the women emigrate, and fulfil themselves somewhere else?"

"All women are not so primitive as you are," said Lossie, sneering, unaware that it was the capacity to _feel_ love as well as evoke it, that made much of Gay's charm; at the back of all her follies was a heart of gold, while a cherry stone represented Lossie's own assets in that particular, save where Carlton was concerned.

But there was no time for further argument, for they found themselves jammed in the midst of a crowd delighted at the recrudescence of the horse, with his grace, beauty, speed, and spirit, just as ten years ago a similar crowd had assembled to see start for the same destination, that marvel of power and ingenuity which was expected to displace him--the motor-car.

The glorious days of the "Old Times" coach seemed to be revived when, drawn by four beautiful greys, their manes braided with red and white ribbons, their heads decked with red and white camelias, a clean-shaven, eager-faced young man, with keen dark eyes, the correct blackness of whose attire was broken by his large red and white buttonhole, brought his coach up with a flourish, and followed by shouts and cheers and many cries of "Good luck," shortly sent it on its way.

Smarter than ever in his tightly-fitting coat, showing the neatly-folded four-in-hand tie, and segment of scarlet gold-buttoned waistcoat, Godden sprang from the leaders' heads, and climbing to his place, blew a cheery blast upon his coach-horn. And then began the American's triumph, for he could not have driven a hundred yards before he found the reward of his enterprise in the way the people, whether on foot or awheel, recognised, and gave way to him as king of the road.

Immediately the way was clear, and at a spanking trot, the coach went bowling along, every horse-drawn or motor-driven vehicle, effacing itself in honour of the fine team. The crowd's eyes sparkled with pleasure and welcome at the sight, policemen saluted, women fluttered their handkerchiefs, men cheered, the while Godden cheerfully chirruped a return of their welcome and good wishes, but of all the people in the streets, those to whom the sight of the splendid horses gave the most joy, were the cabbies, who took off their hats to a man, and waved them with ecstatic delight, shouting themselves hoarse, and nearly falling off their boxes in the process.

It was a royal progress from start to finish--from the time the greys, that had not turned a hair, were changed, and four browns substituted, to the mixed team of two chestnut wheelers, black near leader, and grey on the off lead, that in turn gave way to one of perfectly matched black-browns. At every stage there was a big crowd, till at Brighton it ended in an extraordinary demonstration of enthusiasm, and through dense, cheering masses that only left a narrow lane for the coach's passage, the Metropole was reached.

Blocked in the crowd, Gay inclined an eager ear to the cheers that ran down Piccadilly. She would have loved to go all the way ... her thoughts swerved sharply to racing, which was dangerous, wicked even--did not the poor horses often break their hearts, either dying on the course, or quietly after the race in their stables?

And Trotting was apparently disgraceful (in England), but to drive a coach with such horses as she had just seen--why, that would be at once heavenly and _right_, thought Gay, as she listened to the echoes, and tried to imagine herself handling the ribbons of the Vanderbilt coach.

She longed for someone congenial to talk with, and as if in answer to her wish, Rensslaer, ducking under the horses' heads, suddenly appeared at her elbow, and Gay's enthusiasm boiled over.

"Even if it _is_ only a passing excitement for a man to whose great wealth the newest crazes and the most costly distractions are mere commonplaces," she said, "anyway its a more noble one than any of the other American millionaires have thought of, and Mr. Vanderbilt deserves all the credit as a true sportsman that is already his, or I'm much mistaken."

Rensslaer smiled.

"Aren't you rather hard on millionaires," he said, "almost as hard as your favourite Roosevelt, who has a healthy hatred for the multi-millionaire,--says he is worse than a demagogue? He quotes some chap who declares that the multi's face has grown hard, while his body has grown soft, that his son is a fool, and his daughter a foreign princess, and his nominal pleasures at the best those of tasteless and extravagant luxury, but whose real delight, and real life-work, are the accumulation and use of power in the most sordid, and least elevating form!"

"Out of breath, aren't you?" said Gay. "Well, thank Heaven you're not a multi"--not knowing that Rensslaer _was_--"at least he would admit that you are doing good work with this wonderful Horse Show."

"By the way, I heard from Mr. Mackrell yesterday," said Rensslaer. "He is coming over for it."

Gay, looking between her horse's ears, waiting for the uplifted hand of the constable to fall, and release the traffic, turned pale. There are some debts of honour more binding than the friend's I.O.U. that is never presented, and Gay felt that Carlton's was one of them--a queer prophetic instinct told her that this Horse Show was to be the turning point of her life.

"I was glad to find Mr. Hannen so much better when I went to see him yesterday," went on Rensslaer. "He told me he hoped to be well enough to call on you next week"--here he ducked, and disappeared as the policeman's hand fell, but Lossie, whose ears were quick, was in the seventh heaven of delight.

Carlton was coming back; Chris, whose absence and misfortune had melted Gay's heart, thinned her body, and almost quenched her bloom, was appearing once more on the scene--everything promised well.