Layson, after Holton left, looked around upon the party with a worried eye. "I can't take this matter up, yet," he declared. "Until the race is over I can think of nothing else. Colonel, I'll look after Ike, and then we'll be off to the track."

"So we will, my boy," the Colonel answered, "so we will. Ah, what a race it will be!" As Frank went out, the horseman rubbed his hands with keen anticipations of delight.

"Oh, Colonel," exclaimed Madge, brought back by this turn in the conversation to contemplation of the most exciting prospect which had ever been before her, "won't we have fun?"

"Won't we?" said the Colonel, very happily.

But then Miss Alathea spoke. She had listened to all the talk about the fire, the incendiary, the pursuit, and its dreadful possibilities of lynching, with the keenest of distress. Now the Colonel's calm declaration that, presently, they would be off to the race-track which he had sworn forever to taboo, shifted her mind suddenly from those unpleasant topics.

"Colonel!" she exclaimed, in pained astonishment. "Do you forget your promise?"

"Er—er—" the old horseman began and became speechless.

Madge was all excitement. "Mr. Frank has told me all about it," she said gaily. "I kin see it, now—th' grand-stand filled with folks, th' jockeys ridin' in their bright colors, th' horses a-champin' an' a-pullin' at their bits—an' then—th' start!" The girl had dreamed about such scenes before she had so much as guessed that she might ever witness one, and now, when she was actually about to go out to the track, herself, and with her own eyes gaze upon the greatest race which old Kentucky had known for many a year, it seemed too good to be true. Her eyes sparkled as she spoke, her feet danced as if they might be in the stirrups, her hands clutched on imaginary reins. "All off together, a-goin' like th' lightnin'!" she exclaimed. "Queen Bess a-lyin' back an' lettin' th' others do th' runnin', Ike never touchin' her with whip nor spur until th' last, an' then jest liftin' her in as if she had wings!"

"Stop! Stop!" cried the Colonel. "Not another word, or I'll drop dead in my tracks!" Then, cautiously, to Madge: "I say, little one, couldn't you let me have a word alone with Miss 'Lethe?"

The girl nodded wisely. "I understand," said she; and then, with a quick glance at Miss Alathea, who was not attending, and an earnest and imploring look at the poor Colonel: "Whatever you do don't you forget that we are goin' to th' races!" She left the room.

Forget! The Colonel was not likely to forget about those races! He was in deep misery of mind. "Miss 'Lethe?" he said timidly.

"Yes, Colonel," said the charming lady, turning toward him.

"Miss 'Lethe, have you the remotest idea of the agony I'm suffering?"

"Why, Colonel, what's the matter? Aren't you well?" Miss 'Lethe's keen anxiety was instantaneous.

"Yes—yes—I'm well—that is, I am now, but I shouldn't wonder if I'd be dead before night. Miss 'Lethe, when we made our little arrangement, yesterday, I didn't know that the sale of the mare, your twenty-five thousand dollars, the assessment on Frank's stock, everything was going to depend upon this race. I tell you, if I don't see it, I'm liable to an attack of heart-disease."

"Ah, Colonel," said she, sadly, "I see where your heart really is!"

"With you, Miss 'Lethe, always with you," he urgently assured her; but there was pleading in his eyes which really was pitiful.

"Remember your solemn promise."

"But one little race," he begged. "That wouldn't count, would it? And then swear off forever."

"No, Colonel; no," she firmly answered, "for if you yield, this time, I'll know that in the race for your affections the horse is first, the woman second."

The Colonel sank dejectedly into a chair. "I can't permit you to think that," said he. "I'll—keep my promise."

She went to him, delighted. "Ah, I was sure you would," said she. "Now I can go and finish my shopping in peace. It's all for your good, Colonel—for your good." With a happy smile she left him there, alone.

"For my good!" exclaimed the Colonel, ruefully. "That's what the teacher used to say, but the hickory smarted, just the same. Of course Miss 'Lethe is first—but—but—the horse is a strong second!"

To add to the man's agony, Madge, now, returned, dressed and ready for the most exciting moments of her life. "I'm all ready, Colonel," she said eagerly. "Think we'll have good seats? I do hope I'll be whar I kin see!"

He would not, yet, disappoint the child; he would not, yet,—he could not—admit that he, himself, was to meet with such a bitter disappointment. "You'll see, all right," he told her, "and so will I." But, after a second's thought he added: "I will if I can hire a balloon!"

They heard Neb's excited voice out in the corridor, and, an instant later, the old darkey hurried in. Immediately the Colonel knew, from his appearance, that something had gone seriously wrong.

"What is it, Neb; what is it?" he demanded.

"Fo' de Lawd, sech news!" said Neb. "Sech news!"

"Neb, Neb, what's the matter?" Madge asked, frightened by his manner.

"Somebody," said the negro, "done gone smuggle in a bottle o' whiskey to dat mis'able jockey, Ike, an' he am crazy drunk!"



CHAPTER XVI

"Drunk!" cried the Colonel, shocked inexpressibly. "And the race this afternoon!"

"Marse Frank said you was to come, suh, an' help sobuh him."

Madge approached the Colonel anxiously. "Yes; sober him, if you have to turn him inside out!"

"'Fraid he's done on bofe sides, missy; drunk cl'ar t'rough," said Neb.

The Colonel grasped his hat. "We'll try, we'll try," he said. "Oh, whisky, whisky! What a pity anyone can get too much of so good a thing!"

"I neber could, suh," Neb replied, "but dat 'ar jockey—"

They hurried out together.

Madge was in intense distress. She knew what this might mean. If Queen Bess could not run—and she could not, certainly, without a jockey—the Dyer Brothers would not buy her, probably; and if she were not sold in time, then Layson would be quite unable to meet the assessment on his stock in the coal-mining company. She was by no means certain what this was, or what the reason for it, but she had heard talk of it and knew that it was very serious. Almost beside herself with her anxiety, she could do nothing save sit there and wait for news. The entrance, even of Barbara Holton, who came in, now, was a relief to her overtaxed nerves.

"Say," said she, admitting Barbara nearer to good-fellowship than she had ever done before, "I reckon you have heered the news—Ike's drunk—dead drunk!"

Barbara regarded her excitement with a careful calm. She, herself, had been excited by the news when it had reached her, but a moment since, but she would not let this girl know that. Her role was to endeavor to force the mountain girl back into what she thought her place, at any cost.

"Yes, I've heard," said she, "and it's too late to get another jockey, so Queen Bess can't run."

She had formed a plan, deep in her mind, and had sought the mountain-girl with the skilful scheme.

"Then Mr. Frank is goin' to be ruined!" Madge exclaimed, dejectedly.

"Not unless you wish it," Barbara replied, looking straight into her eyes.

"Dellaw! Me wish that? Just you tell me what you mean!"

The bluegrass girl stood looking at the mountain maiden with appraising eye for a few seconds. Then she crossed the room and stood close by her side, while she tapped upon the table nervously with her carefully gloved fingers.

"If this sale fails, as it seems it must," she said, slowly, "it rests with you whether my father will advance the money to pay the assessment on that stock of Mr. Layson's."

"Your father give him the money?" Madge said in astonishment. "Well, I'd never thought o' that! But what have I got to do about it?"

The situation was a hard one, even for the self-possession of the lowlands girl, who had inherited her father's coolness in emergency as well as some other traits less desirable. Her color rose and she tried, earnestly, to gather words which would express the thought she had in mind without including a confession of the weakness of her own position. This she could not, do, however. She walked over to the window, gazed from it, for a moment, at the passing crowds, and then returned to Madge, to tell her bluntly: "I want you to go away from here."

"Me go away? What for?"

It was impossible, Barbara now discovered, to make her meaning wholly clear, without some measure of humiliation. The first thing that was, obviously, necessary was a statement of facts as they were, and this must include confession of her own sore weakness. She hesitated, trying to avoid it, but when she quite decided that it could not be helped, plunged on with a perfect frankness. What she wished was immediately to gain her point. If she must eat a bit of humble pie in order to accomplish this, why, she would eat it, much as she disliked the diet.

"Can't you see that it is you who stand between Frank and me?" she cried. "If it hadn't been for you, I should have been his promised wife! If you will go away and never see him again, I can win him back."

Madge was dumbfounded. The cold and utter selfishness of the girl's proposal was astounding. She looked at Barbara with eyes in which incredulous amazement gave way, slowly, to an expression of chill wonder. "Say, you don't seem to squander many thoughts on other people! S'posin' I happen to love him a little, myself!"

Barbara laughed scornfully. Sprung from low stock, herself, but reared in luxury, she had the most complete contempt for anyone whom circumstances had denied advantages such as she had known. "You—you love him!" she exclaimed.

The words had slipped from Madge's lips without forethought, and, instantly, she very much regretted them; but, now that she had uttered them she did not so much as think of trying to recall them or deny their truth. "Yes, and I ain't ashamed of it," said she. "I do love him—a thousand times better nor you ever dreamed of."

"What good will it do you?" asked her rival, coldly. "You don't suppose he'll ever think of making you his wife! Why, look at the difference between you and me!"

"Yes," said Madge, sarcastically, "there is a powerful sight of differ! You'd be willin' to ruin' him to win him, while I'd be willin' to gin up my happiness to save him!"

Barbara, more in earnest than she ever had been in her life before, took a quick step toward the mountain girl. "Then prove it by going away," said she, "and I will see that my father advances Frank Layson the money he needs." She looked at her eagerly. "Do you promise?"

"No," said Madge, with firm decision. "No; I won't."

"Then it is you who will ruin him."

While they had been talking an idea had sprung to sudden flower in Madge's mind. It was a daring, an unheard of plan that had occurred to her. There were details of it which filled her with shrinking. She knew that if she put it into practice, and it ever became generally known, she would be the talk of Lexington and that not all that talk would be complimentary. She knew that, after she had carried out the plan, even the man for whom she thought of doing it might look at her with scorn. But it was the only plan which her alert and anxious brain could find which promised anything at all. And if it won, perhaps—perhaps—he might not scorn her! At any rate it was a sacrifice, and sacrifice for him was an attractive thought to her.

"Me ruin him?" she said to Barbara. "Don't you be too sure! There is a shorter and a better way nor yours, to save him, an' I'm goin' to try it!"

The bluegrass girl, astonished, would have questioned her, but Madge waited for no questioning. Without another word she hurried from the room, in a mad search for Colonel Doolittle.

* * * * *

From the country round about for miles the planters had come into Lexington upon their blooded mounts, their wives, daughters, sweethearts, riding in great carriages. Now and then a vehicle, coming from some far-away plantation, was drawn by a gay four-in-hand, and the drivers of such equipages, negroes always, showed a haughty scorn of their black fellow-men who travelled humbly on the backs of mules, or trudged the long and dusty way on foot. Gorgeous were the costumes of the ladies whom the carriages conveyed; elegant the dress of the gay gentlemen who rode beside the vehicles on prancing steeds, gallant escorts of Kentucky's lovely womanhood, prepared, especially, to watch the carriage-horses when the town was reached and guard against disasters due to their encounter with such disturbing and unusual things as crowds, brass-bands and other marvels of a great occasion.

Everywhere upon the sidewalks people swarmed like ants, delighted with the calm perfection of the day, the magnetism of the crowds, the blare of martial music, the novelty of passing strangers, and, above all, by the prospect of the great race which, for weeks, had been the theme of conversation everywhere throughout the section.

In the spacious corridors and big bar-rooms of the city's hostelries the rich men of the section vied with flashily dressed strangers, in magnitude of wagers, and the gambling fever spread from these important centers to the very alleys of the negro quarters. Poor indeed was the old darkey who could not find two-bits to wager on the race; small, indeed, the piccaninny who was not wise enough in the sophisticated ways of games of chance to lay a copper with a comrade or to join a pool by means of which he and his fellows were enabled to participate in more important methods of wooing fickle Fortune.

Here and there and everywhere were the piccaninnies from Woodlawn, the Layson place, crying the virtues of the mare they worshipped and her owner whom they each and everyone adored, boasting of the wagers they had made, strutting in the consciousness that ere the moment for the great race came "Unc" Neb would gather them together to add zest to the occasion with their brazen instruments and singing. The "Whangdoodles" were the envy of every colored lad in town who was not of their high elect, and created, about noon, a great diversion upon one of the main streets, by gathering, when they were quite certain that their leader could by no means get at them, and singing on a corner for more coppers to be wagered on Queen Bess. The shower of coin which soon rewarded their smooth, well-trained harmonies, burned holes in their pockets, too, until it was invested in the only things which, on this day, the lads thought worth the purchasing—tickets on the race in which the wondrous mare would run.

Through the gay crowd old Neb was wandering, disconsolate, burdened with the melancholy news of the defection of the miserable jockey, looking, everywhere, for Miss Alathea Layson, but without success. He stopped upon a corner, weary of the search and of the woe which weighed him down.

"Marse Frank," he muttered, "say I war to tell Miss 'Lethe de bad news; but he didn't tell me how to find a lady out shoppin'. Needle in a haystack ain't nawthin'! Reckon 'bout de bes' dat I kin do is stand heah on dis cohnuh an' cotch huh when she comes back to de hotel."

He stood there for fully fifteen minutes, peering in an utter desolation of woe, at every passing face, but finding nowhere that one which he sought. Then, at a distance, he saw the Colonel coming. The expression on the horseman's face amazed him and filled him with an instant hope that something had turned up to rob the situation of the horror which had darkened it, for him, ever since he had discovered that the jockey had disgraced himself.

"Dar come Marse Cunnel," he exclaimed, in his astonishment, "a-lookin' mighty happy! Dat ain't right, now; dat ain't right, unduh de succumstances."

He hurried to the Colonel, who, instead of seeming sorrowful, discouraged, wroth, beamed at him with a genial eye.

"What's the matter, Neb?" he asked. "You look like a funeral!"

"Dat's de way I feel, suh; wid no jockey fo' Queen Bess an' Marse Frank good as ruined."

"Neb," said the Colonel, coolly, "you don't mean to be a liar, but you are one."

"What?" cried the darkey in delight. "Oh Marse Cunnel, call me anyt'ing ef tain't so about de mare!"

"Of course it isn't," said the Colonel happily. "I have found a jockey, Neb; a jockey."

"Praise de Lawd!" cried the old negro.

"One of the best," the Colonel went on, gaily. "Just come in from the—from the east. I engaged him at once, so you get word to Frank. In five minutes we'll be on our way out to the track."

Neb's spirits had instantly revived. Six inches droop was gone from his old shoulders. "It'll be de grandest race eber run in ol' Kentucky! Lawsy, Cunnel, won't it tickle you to death to see Queen Bess romp in a winnuh?"

Instantly the Colonel's high elation faded. More than the droop which had been in Neb's shoulders now oppressed the horseman's. His face clouded. "There he goes, too!" he cried. "Neb, another word like that and I shall brain you! Do you hear me? I—I shan't be there!"

"Not be dar!" Neb exclaimed. "Kain't swaller dat, suh. Ef you should miss dat race, why, you'd drop daid."

"I believe you, Neb—believe you. I say, Neb, look here. I have promised on the honor of a Kentuckian, never to enter another race-track. I must keep my word; but, for the Lord's sake, isn't there a knot-hole, that you know of, somewhere in the fence, which would let me see the race without going inside?"

Neb knew that race-track as he knew the plot of hard-trodden ground before the little cabin where he had been born back of the big house out at Woodlawn. Many a race had he seen surreptitiously when he had not funds to buy admission to the track. He grinned, remembering talk which he had heard between the Colonel and Miss 'Lethe, and understanding, now. He laughed. "Oh, I yi!" he cried. "Marse Cunnel, dar ain't nobody'll git ahead of you! You bet dar is a knot-hole, not fur off frum de gran'-stan', neither, an' a tree, too, you could climb, stan's mighty handy."

The Colonel groaned. "I climb a tree to peek above a race-track fence!" said he. "No; never. They'd think I was trying to save my admission fee! The knot-hole will have to do for me, Neb. You've saved me. Heaven bless you! Have a cigar—they're good."

"T'ankee, suh," said Neb, reaching for the weed the Colonel now held toward him. "Lawsy, ain't dat jus' a whoppuh? Whah you-all git sech mon'sous big cigahs as dat?"

"I'm only smoking half as many, now, so I get 'em double size," the Colonel answered, sighing but not wholly miserable.

Neb did not see the humor of this detail. He was thinking of the race and of Queen Bess. "Hooray fo' de Cunnel!" he exclaimed, irrelevantly, to a little group of colored men who had been gathering. "Whatever he says yo' kin gamble on. Lawsy, ain't I glad I's got my money on Queen Bess? Golly, won't Marse Holton jes' feel cheap when he done heahs dis news? Seen him down dar in de pool-room, not so long ago, a-puttin' up his money plumb against Queen Bess. Goin' to lose it, suah, he will." He went off, muttering, and shaking his old head. "Somehow I jes' feels it in mah bones dat he ain't true to Marse Frank, yessuh. If I evah fin's it out fo' suah, I'll jes' paralyse him!"

He had quite forgotten that he had come out to find Miss Alathea, and was not looking for her when he actually stumbled into her.

"Why, Neb, what are you doing?" she said, recoiling.

"Pahdon, pahdon, please, Miss 'Lethe," said the negro. "I was thinkin' of de sweet bimeby an' waitin' fo' to tell de news to you—fust dat Ike got drunk an' Marse Frank war gwine hab to scratch de mare—"

"Oh, dear! Oh, dear! Then Frank—why, he'll lose everything!"

"Hol' on, Miss 'Lethe; dat de fust half, only. Secon' half am dat Marse Cunnel found a jockey an' Queen Bess am gwine ter run."

"Bless his heart!" she cried. "I wonder if it's wrong for me to pray that that jockey will win." She looked, almost embarrassed at the aged negro for a moment, and then, mustering up courage, said: "Neb, look here. I'm ashamed to acknowledge so much interest in a horse-race, but it seems as if I can't wait to hear of the result."

"Lawsy, I don't blame you, none; feel dat way mahse'f."

"I must know the result the instant the race is decided."

"Send yo' wuhd right off, Miss 'Lethe."

"Oh, I can't wait for that. Neb, I never did such a thing before and never will again, and, even now, I won't enter a race-track; but, Neb, isn't there some place outside the fence where I could watch the race without actually going in?"

Neb doubled up in silent laughter. The old negro was enjoying life, exceedingly, on this, the day, which, for a time, had seemed so full of gloom. The white folks were quite at his mercy. "You bet dar is," said he, "a knot-hole not fur f'm de gran'-stan', an' a tree what you could climb, right handy."

Miss Alathea was not favorable to the thought of climbing trees, and said so. "No, no; the knot-hole will be far better for me."

"But, Miss 'Lethe, why, de Cunnel—"

She did not let him make his explanation. "Sh! Sh!" she hissed. "Not a word of this to him, or anyone! Will you show me, when the time comes?"

"Oh, I'll show you," Neb replied, and before he had a chance to add a word she had hurried off into the crowd.

"I war gwine to tell her dat de Cunnel'd be dar, too, but she wouldn't wait to heah. Wal, I reckon she'll jes' fin' 'im when she git dar."

Down the street his piccaninny band came straggling, looking for him.

"Hol' on, chillun; hol' on," he cried, and joined them. "Now yo' lissen. Yo' is not to make a squawk until the end of de Ashlan' Oaks. Yo's to sabe yo' bref to honuh ouah Queen Bess. If she wins, yo' staht in playin' 'Dixie' as yo' nevuh played afo'. If she loses yo's to play, real slow an' mo'nful, 'Massa's in de Col', Col', Groun'.'"

In the meantime the Colonel, in a quiet spot, had joined the jockey who had been discovered to take the place of drunken Ike. The unknown rider was wrapped closely in an ulster, from beneath which riding boots, unusually small, peeped, now and then, as the feet within them moved somewhat nervously about.

"All right, are you?" he inquired.

"I ain't afeared," the jockey answered, "but I'm powerful nervous. Never had on clo'es like these before, an'—don't you look at me!"

Strange talk, this was, for the jockey who was soon to ride Queen Bess for the capture of the Ashland Oaks and the salvation of the fortune of the house of Layson!

"Don't look at you!" said the Colonel, in expostulation, and, in the next sentence, revealed a secret which he was guarding carefully from everyone. "See here, little girl, you've got to face thousands and not wince, and you can't ride in that overcoat, either."

But the jockey wrapped the coat still tighter. "Oh, sho! That can't make no differ—just a little coat!"

"I tell you it's impossible. It would give the game away at once. Come, take it off. Practice up on me."

The jockey shivered nervously. "Reckon I will hev to. Say, turn your back till I am ready."

The Colonel turned his back, somewhat impatiently. The time was getting short. "All right, but hurry up."

The jockey pulled the long coat partly off, then, in a panic, shrugged it on again. "Oh, now, you're lookin'!"

"Not a wink," declared the Colonel.

"Wal, here goes!" This time the coat came wholly off and the jockey who had been discovered to take the place of drunken Ike stood quite revealed. The voice which warned the Colonel of this was a faint and faltering one. "Now," it said timidly.

The Colonel turned. "Hurrah!"

The jockey held the coat up in a panic.

"See here, now—none o' that!" the Colonel warned. "Give it to me." He reached his hand out for the coat, and, reluctantly, the jockey let him take it.

There stood the trimmest and most graceful figure ever garbed in racing blouse, knickers, boots and cap, with flushed face, dilating, frightened eyes and hands not a little tremulous. The girl who had told Barbara Holton that she would not hesitate to make a sacrifice to save the man she loved was making one—a very great one—the sacrifice of what, her whole life long, she had considered fitting woman's modesty. Queen Bess must win and there was no one else to ride her. The mountain-girl shrank from the thought of going, thus, before a multitude, as shyly as would the most highly educated and most socially precise girl in the grand-stand, near, which, now, was filling with the gallantry and beauty of Kentucky; but she did not let her nervous tremors conquer her. There was no other way to save the day for Layson, and, somehow, the day must certainly be saved.

The Colonel, now, spoke very seriously as she stood there, shrinking from his gaze. There was not a smile upon his face. It was plain that he regarded the whole matter with the utmost gravity.

"Now, little one, you begin to realize what this means," said he. "Or—no, you don't and I've got to be square with you if it spoils the prettiest horse-race ever seen in old Kentucky. I tell you, my dear child, we're mighty particular about our women, down here in the bluegrass. We'd think it an eternal shame and a disgrace forever for one of them to ride a public race in a costume like the one that you have on, and it would mean not less than social ruin to the man that married her. If anyone should find it out, what you are going to do might stand between you and your happiness. I'm warning you because I know I ought to. Think it over and then tell me if you're willing to face it—willing to take all the risks."

"I don't need to think it over," Madge said firmly. "I said as I'd gin up my happiness to save him, an' I will. Colonel, I've got on my uniform, I've enlisted for th' war, an' I am goin' to fight it through!"

"A thoroughbred!" he cried. "A thoroughbred, and I always said it of you. Come on, little one."



CHAPTER XVII

Brilliant as a garden of flowers was the grand-stand where the fairest of old Kentucky's wondrous women were as numerous as were her gallant men; full of handsome figures were the lawns, where old Kentucky's youth and manhood strolled and smoked and gossipped of the day's great race to come; like an ebon sea in storm was the great crowd of blacks which in certain well-defined limits crowded to the rail about the track. The blare of the band kept the air a-tremble almost constantly, the confused, uneven murmur of a great crowd filled the pauses between brazen outbursts. Everywhere was life and gayety, intense excitement, as the moment for the starting of the famous Ashland Oaks approached. The cries of the book-makers rose, strident, from the betting-ring; on the tracks the jockeys, exercising or trying out their mounts, were, each after his own kind, preparing for the struggle of their lives; stable-boys, and the hundred other species of race-track hangers-on which swarm at such times to the front, were everywhere in evidence; touts with shifty eyes slipped, here and there, among the sightseers, looking for some credulous one who might be willing to pay well for doubtful information. Every minute amidst the throng the words "Queen Bess" might be heard at any chosen point, as the crowd gossipped eagerly about the horse which had been looked on as the favorite, but which, many positively now declared, had been so injured in the fire that she would run but poorly in the race which, it had been thought, would be the most sensational effort of her life.

Frank, nervous and excited, stood in the paddock, watch in hand, with old Neb by his side.

"Why doesn't that jockey come?" he asked, for the hundredth time, almost beside himself with worry as the moments slipped away.

"He'll come, Marse Frank," said Neb. "You kin gamble on de Cunnel."

"If I only knew what kind of a jockey he is!" Then, as Horace Holton came up, smiling greetings: "Holton, how's the betting?"

"Can't you hear?" said Holton, as a vagrant breeze brought to their ears bits of the vocal tumult from the betting-ring.

"Ten to nine against Queen Bess," Frank heard a voice call loudly, although the crowd's great murmur made the words come indistinctly to his ears. "Even on Catalpa," was the next penetrating cry, and then: "Two to one, Evangeline!"

The young owner shuddered. Could it be possible that Neb was right and that the Colonel's jockey would appear on time, or were the dire predictions of defeat which, he knew, were being made everywhere around him, true prophecies? Tales of all but fatal injuries to the handsome mare had been freely circulated, and, despite denials in the newspapers, were still alive, and these he knew to be quite false; but he knew of the other dire disaster—the defection of his jockey—of which the crowd was also well aware. He had not the slightest doubt that if Queen Bess should run at all she would do all that her best friends expected of her and more; but it seemed to him a possibility that he would find it necessary, at the last minute, to withdraw her from the race entirely, for sheer lack of a rider.

Again the breeze brought from the betting-ring the loud shouts of the book-makers. The message that they told was most depressing to the worried owner.

"Why, this morning she was the favorite," he said, "and now the odds are all against her!"

Holton nodded. "On the strength o' this jockey as nobody knows. Got any money on, yourself, Layson?"

"Not a cent. I've enough at stake, already."

Holton smiled unpleasantly, intimating that Frank's lack of betting on his horse was proof positive that the worst tales told were true. "That settles it. The bookies are right. Th' mare's no chance with a new jockey, an' you know it."

"If I were betting," said Frank angrily, "I'd back her with every dollar that I have on earth."

Holton smiled at him unpleasantly. "I say she can't win and you know it." He waited for some answer from the anxious owner, but received none. Then, taking out his check-book: "See here—I'll bet you five-thousand even against her!"

Frank, annoyed but helpless, shook his head. "I haven't the money," he admitted.

"You ain't got the sand!" said Holton, aggravatingly.

Frank turned from him angrily, and old Neb, who had listened, stepped quickly up to him. "Marse Frank," he pleaded, "don' yo' let dat white-trash bluff yo'!" The old darkey's voice was tremulous, his eyes were moist with feeling for his humiliated master. A great resolve thrilled through him. "See heah, honey, I's be'n sabin' all mah life. I's got a pile o' money in de bank. Take it all, now, honey, an' bet it on Queen Bess."

Frank shook his head, but smiled at the old darkey, touched alike by his devotion to himself and confidence in the mare they both loved. "No, no, Neb; not your money," he replied. He stood in deep thought, for a moment, tapping the ground nervously with worried foot. "But I'll back the mare for all I'm worth!" he finally declared. "If she loses, I'm a ruined man, anyway." He turned, now, to Holton. "Holton," he said, "I've got just three thousand dollars in the bank. I'll put it all on Queen Bess against your five-thousand."

It seemed, almost, as if Holton had been waiting for this offer, for his smile broadened as he found that he had goaded Layson into making it. "I'll take it," he said quickly, and then, turning to the crowd about them, among which were some of the state's best citizens, he added: "Gentlemen, you're witnesses. Three-thousand against five-thousand on Queen Bess."

They nodded, and not one of them but looked at Layson with commiseration, as at a man foredoomed to bitter disappointment.

Neb, however, grinned at Holton impishly. "Yes; you'll look mighty sick when yo' hab to pay it, too."

From the judge's stand rang out the silvery notes of a quavering bugle-call, and Holton smiled unpleasantly.

"The call to th' post," said he, "an' whar's your jockey?"

"He'll be here on time," said Frank, voicing a confidence which it was hard for him to feel. He turned, then, to the darkey. "Neb, bring out Queen Bess."

The excitement, all around them, was intensifying, every minute. Jockeys, now, were mounting their horses, and riding off for the short canter to the judges' stand. As each appeared in view of the great crowd in and about the grand-stand a mighty shout arose.

Holton's smile was broadening. "If that jockey doesn't show up mighty quick," he sneered, "you're out of the race."

Just as he spoke old Neb returned, with the superb mare behind him, saddled, bridled, ready for the race, fretting at her bit, impatient of the crowds and noise.

"Who knows whether he's coming, at all?" said Holton, a bit dashed at sight of the fine mare's superb condition, but still sneering. "Nobody's seen him."

Neb looked off toward the weighing-room. "Yo' 're wrong," he shouted, capering with amazing spryness for one whose limbs were old and stiff, "fo' heah he comes!"

Every member of the party turned, in haste, to look in the direction whence Neb pointed.

They saw a slight, graceful figure, dressed in the brilliant colors of the Layson stable, which, without so much as glancing at them, ran to Queen Bess and took a place upon the far side of the mare, where, stooping as if to look carefully to the saddle-girths, its face was quickly hidden. But, even as the jockey stooped, one of his hands held out to Frank, across the saddle, a little folded paper.

Without paying much attention to the jockey, Layson took this note and hastily unfolded it. "It's from the Colonel," he announced. "I knew he'd never fail me."

Then he read, aloud, so all might hear:

"This will be handed to you by a jockey I have just engaged. He comes from the east and is highly recommended. I know his endorser. Regretting that the promise of a Kentuckian prevents me from being with you, I am yours regretfully, on the outside, SANDUSKY DOOLITTLE."

"It's all right!" Frank shouted, gleefully, and then, to the strange jockey: "Quick, on the mare and off to the post!"

Without a word, without a second's pause, Madge, for the unknown jockey was, of course, the little mountain girl, jumped upon Queen Bess and hastily rode off, to be greeted, with a mighty outburst of cheering and applause as the favorite appeared before the waiting crowds in unmistakably fine condition and mounted by a rider whose every movement showed a perfect knowledge of the work and complete sympathy with the beautiful animal he rode.

* * * * *

Doomed by his promise on the honor of a gentleman to Miss Alathea, to witnessing the race from the outside, if he witnessed it at all, Colonel Sandusky Doolittle, fully aware of the unusual interest of the moments, some account of which has just been made, was sunk in melancholy after he had sent Madge through the magic portals, with explicit instructions as to exactly what to do when once she was safe inside. He was breathing hard from the mere exertion of preventing his unruly feet from running to the gate, of keeping his unruly hand from diving deep into his pocket for the entrance fee. These preventions he accomplished, though, without once really weakening, and was safe at a good distance from the tempting gate when the crowd within began to shout as the horses were brought out.

"There, they're bringing out the horses!" he exclaimed, unhappily. He set his jaws as might one who, with a great effort, abstains from food when famishing. "I didn't go in!" he muttered. "I've kept my word, though it has nearly finished me!"

Anxiously, if hurriedly, he searched along the fence for the knot-hole Neb had told him of. Twice, in his great eagerness, he passed it by, but, on the third inspection he discovered it, and placed his eye to it. In a moment he backed away, dejectedly. "I can't see worth a cent!" he bitterly complained. "It's not hole enough for me!" Lost, in his disappointment, even to shame for the wretched pun, he straightened up, surveying his immediate surroundings.

Close by was the tree which Neb had also spoken of. He examined it with an appraising eye, then looked about to see what spectators were near. No one was in sight save a pair of piccaninnies, down the fence a hundred yards or so, with eyes glued to other knot-holes or to cracks.

"To the deuce with dignity!" he cried. "I'll just inspect that tree."

He was doing this with care, when, breathless and eager, a lady hurried toward him. As the tree intervened between them he did not see her coming, nor did she note his presence. It would have been quite plain to anyone who had observed her that she was engaged upon a quest much like that which he had pursued, for she carefully inspected each plank in the high fence, as, slowly and cautiously lest she should pass unheeded that which she was seeking eagerly, she made her way in his direction.

"Everybody's at the races," she thought, comforting herself. "I'm perfectly safe. No one in the world will see me.... But where is that blessed knot-hole?"

Suddenly her eye chanced on it, and, an instant later, was applied to it, the while the Colonel paused, with his back to her, still anxiously inspecting the tree.

"Ah!" said Miss Alathea, aloud, as she caught a glimpse of something interesting inside the fence.

Instantly the Colonel turned and looked down at her, startled. Then: "A woman!" he exclaimed, beneath his breath. "A woman at my knot-hole!"

Firmly determined to maintain his right he sternly approached her.

"Madam!" he exclaimed, as incensed by her usurpation of the knot-hole as he would have been, at ordinary times, by theft of watch or pocket-book, and tapped her lightly on the shoulder.

She shrank back from the knot-hole, startled and indignant. "Sir!" she cried, and then, as he recognized her, she turned and saw who had addressed her.

"Colonel Sandusky Doolittle!" she exclaimed, amazed.

"Miss Alathea Layson!" cried the Colonel, equally amazed, at first, but winding up his gesture of surprise with a low and courtly bow.

"Colonel, what are you doing here?"

"Madame," he countered, "what are you doing here?"

Miss Alathea's dignity forsook her. "Colonel," she confessed, "I couldn't wait to hear the result."

"No more could I," he somewhat sheepishly admitted.

"But I didn't enter the race-track," she explained in haste.

"I was equally firm."

"And Neb told me of this knot-hole."

"The rascal—he told me of it, too."

"Colonel," she said, smiling, "we must forgive each other. If you really must look, there is the knot-hole."

"No, Miss 'Lethe," he said gallantly, "I resign the knot-hole to you. I shall climb the tree." Without delay (for sounds from the barrier's far side hinted to his practiced ear that matters of much moment were progressing, there) he scrambled with much more difficulty than dignity into the spreading crotch.

"Oh, be careful Colonel!" Miss Alathea cried, alarmed. "Don't break your neck!" But she added, as an afterthought: "But be sure to get where you can see."

"Ah, what a gallant sight!" he cried as he found himself in a position whence he could command a view of the exciting scene within the barrier. "There's Catalpa ... and Evangeline ... and ... yes, there is Queen Bess!"

A burst of cheering rose from the crowd within.

Miss Alathea was on tip-toe with excitement. "What's that?" she begged.

"A false start," he answered, scarcely even glancing down at her. "They'll make it this time, though," he added, and she could see his knuckles whiten with the strain as he gripped a rough limb of the tree with vise-like fingers.

A moment later and the shouting became a very tempest of sound.

"They're off!" he cried, staring through his field glasses in an excitement which promised, if he did not curb it, to send him tumbling from his shaky foothold. "Oh, what a splendid start!"

"Who's ahead?" inquired Miss Alathea, very much excited. "Colonel, who's ahead?"

"Catalpa sets the pace, the others lying well back."

"Why doesn't Queen Bess come to the front?" Miss Alathea cried, as if he were to blame for the disquieting news he had reported to her. "Oh," she exclaimed, to the Colonel's great astonishment, "if I were only on that mare!"

"At the half," the Colonel shouted, beside himself with worry, "Evangeline takes the lead ... Catalpa next ... the rest are bunched."

Miss Alathea, at the moment, was trying to see satisfactorily, through the very knot-hole which the Colonel had abandoned. She sprang from it hastily, however, and to the foot of the tree which acted as his pedestal, when he exclaimed:

"Oh, great heavens! There's a fall ... a jam ... and Queen Bess is left behind three lengths!" He leaned so far out that he heard the limb beneath him crack, and, in hastening to a firmer footing, almost lost his balance. This startled him, and, for an instant, took his eager gaze away from the struggling horses on the track within, but he quickly regained poise. "She hasn't the ghost of a show!" he cried, disheartened. "Look! Look!"

Miss Alathea hugged the tree and looked, not at the horses, for that was quite impossible, but up at him with wide, imploring eyes.

"She's at it again, though, now!" he cried. "It's beyond anything mortal, but she's gaining ... gaining!"

Miss Alathea's excitement now was every bit as great as his. She had never seen a race in all her life, yet, now, she performed there at the foot of the great tree, a series of evolution not unlike those of many a "rooter" at the track within. She jumped up and down upon her toe's, clenched her hands and cried: "Oh, keep it up! Keep it up!"

"At the three-quarters she's only five lengths behind the leader and still gaming!" cried the Colonel, in excited optimism.

Miss Alathea could no longer endure the agony of waiting on the ground for his reports. Instead she tried to scramble to his side, but, failing, utterly, to accomplish this unaided, held her hands up to him, crying: "Oh, pull, pull! I can't stand it! I've just got to see!"

The Colonel turned upon his perch and looked down at her, smiling. "Coming up, Miss 'Lethe?" he inquired. "All right, don't break your neck, but get where you can see." Hastily he gave her such assistance as his absorbed attention to the events within the fence permitted, and, with a wild scramble, she found herself close by his side, holding half to him, half to a curving branch.

"Look! Look!" he cried, again. "In the stretch! Her head is at Catalpa's crupper ... now at her saddle-bow ... but she can't gain another inch. Still ... yes ... yes ... she lifts her! See!... See!... Great God! She wins!"

Within the fence wild pandemonium broke loose. The crowd went mad with shouting. Hats, handkerchiefs, canes, umbrellas, flew into the air as if blown upward by the mad explosion of the crowd's enthusiasm. The band was playing "Dixie."

Frank and Neb rushed forward to lift from the winner the victorious jockey, who by such superb riding as that track had never seen before, had snatched victory from defeat after the mare had been delayed in the bad pocket which, from his distant point of survey, had alarmed the Colonel. The jockey eluded them, however and, with face averted, hurried with the splendid mare back to the paddock, and there disappeared, disregarding the crowd's wild shouts of acclamation.

Holton stood near Frank, white-faced and angry. Old Neb, as he ran beside Queen Bess, looked back at him and grinned.



CHAPTER XVIII

Miss Alathea, on the day after the great race, sat waiting for the Colonel in the handsome old library of Woodlawn, worrying about her unconventionalities of the preceding day. When she heard his voice, out in the hall, telling Neb to carry certain bundles into the library and knew, of course, that he would follow after them almost immediately, her heart throbbed fiercely in her bosom. She shrank back into a window recess, too embarrassed to face him without first pausing to gather up her courage.

"Put 'em there, Neb," said the Colonel, pointing to the table, and then, after the packages had been arranged to suit him: "Here, take this, and drink to the jockey that rode Queen Bess."

"T'ankee, Marse Cunnel, t'ankee," Neb replied, pocketing the tip. "Oh, warn't it gran'? An' yo' climbed de tree, arter all!"

"Sh! Clear out, you rascal!"

Neb did not go at once, but, with the boldness of an old and privileged retainer, stood there, chuckling. "Climbed de tree!" he gurgled. "An' so did Miss 'Lethe!"

With this he slapped his knee, and, laughing boisterously, left the room as the embarrassed lady of the house stepped out of her concealment.

"Ah, Miss 'Lethe," said the Colonel, "good morning."

"I expected you back from Lexington last night, Colonel." She looked at him reproachfully.

"Stayed over to celebrate, my dear," the Colonel answered. "Stayed to celebrate the victory." With a beaming face he advanced upon the lady, plainly planning an embrace.

But she eluded him. "Wait a moment, Colonel. On what did you celebrate?"

The Colonel laughed. "Oh, I didn't forget. I celebrated on ginger-ale and soda-pop."

Miss Alathea smiled with happy satisfaction. She eluded him no longer, but, herself, went to him and bestowed the kiss.

"I doubt if my stomach ever recovers from the insult," said the Colonel, delighted by the kiss but remembering the mildness of the beverages which had marked his jubilation. "Miss 'Lethe, a julep—a mint-julep—before I perish."

With a smile she crossed the room to where, upon the side-board (a side-board is an adjunct of all well-regulated libraries in old Kentucky), a snowy damask cloth concealed glorious somethings. With a graceful sweep she took it from them and revealed three juleps in their glory of green-crowns. "Look, Colonel!"

"Three! Great heavens!" the Colonel cried, delighted. He took one and disposed of it in haste.

"I mixed them myself," Miss 'Lethe said.

The Colonel drank another, but less rapidly.

"Remember," she said, warningly, "three and no more!"

"Yes, yes," he granted. "I must save the other one." It was difficult to sip it, for Miss Alathea's juleps were like nectar to his thirsty palate, but he restrained himself and drank of this last ambrosial glass with great deliberation, trying to make it last as long as possible.

"What are all those bundles, Colonel?" asked Miss Alathea, pointing to the packages which old Neb had brought in.

"They're for Madge. She bought them yesterday." He sighed. "Ah, will you ever forget yesterday?"

"Oh, don't speak of it!"

"Can't help it." The Colonel waxed enthusiastic at the mere memory of the great occasion. "Whoopee!" he cried. "What a race it was!"

"To think," said Miss Alathea, "that I—I—should enter a race-track!"

"To think that I—should stay out of one!"

"It was all your fault, Colonel," said Miss Alathea. "In your excitement after the race you grasped my hand and I was compelled to follow."

"How strange!" exclaimed the Colonel, slowly, with a slight smile tickling at the corners of his mouth. "At times I fancied you were in the lead, I following."

"Colonel," said the lady slowly, "perhaps I might as well confess. I've made a discovery. The sin isn't so much in looking at the horses run—it's in betting on them. That's where souls are lost."

"And likewise money," said the Colonel, nodding, gravely.

"So, Colonel, if you'll promise not to bet, I've no objection to your attending the races in moderation."

In delighted amazement the Colonel forgot that that last julep could be brought to a quick end by hurried management and took a hasty and a mammoth swallow. "What!" he cried. "Can I believe it? Miss 'Lethe, you're an angel! It's the last drop in my cup of happiness!"

Miss Alathea shyly smiled—smiled, indeed, a bit shame-facedly. "There's one condition, Colonel—that you take me along—yes, to watch over you."

"Take you with me?" said the Colonel. He paused in puzzled contemplation of her for an instant. "Oh, I catch on. You'll go with the children to see the animals!" He laughed. "You rather like it." He became enthusiastic. "No more knot-holes or trees for us! At last—two souls with but a single thought, two hearts that beat when Queen Bess won! Here's to our future happiness!"

He raised the glass and would have drunk from it, but, now, alas! the glass was empty. It surprised and grieved him, but, when Miss Alathea held her hand out, quietly, for the vessel which had held the final julep but which now held it no longer, he yielded it up gracefully nor asked her to refill it.

As Miss Alathea placed the empty glass upon the side-board Madge entered from the hallway. She ran up to the Colonel. "I heard you'd come," she said, "an' couldn't wait. Say, air it all fixed about Queen Bess?"

"Fixed?" cried the gallant horseman. "Well I should remark! Queen Bess is sold and paid for and a draft for the assessment forwarded to the Company. Inside of a year Frank will have the income of a prince."

"All," said Miss Alathea, "owing to that mysterious jockey who disappeared immediately after the race. Oh, I'd like to kiss that boy!"

"If you did, I should not be jealous," said the Colonel with an air of generosity.

"Miss 'Lethe, kiss me. Won't I do as well?" Madge asked, going to her.

Miss Alathea kissed her, but was still thinking of the unknown jockey, who, in the nick of time, had come from nowhere, materialized from nothing, to save the day for Frank by riding Queen Bess to victory. "I feel as if I must know his name," she said. "Madge, help me persuade the Colonel to tell us." She went to him and petted him. "Colonel, you will not refuse me!"

Madge looked at him apprehensively, warningly. "An' I reckon you won't refuse me, Colonel." Then, going close to him, she whispered: "Remember, mum's the word!"

"Away, you tempters, away!" the Colonel cried, and waved them from him. "It's a professional secret, and I've promised to keep it on the honor of a Kentucky gentleman—just as I promised you, Miss 'Lethe."

"As you promised me? That's enough, Colonel—not another word!"

Madge nodded, smilingly. "That's right, Colonel. Mustn't break your word." Just then she caught sight of the bundles which the Colonel had had Neb bring in. "Oh, are them my bundles, Colonel?"

"Every one of them."

The girl hurried to the mysteriously fascinating packages and began investigation of their contents. "Thank ye, thank ye!" she exclaimed, while she was busy with the wrappings. "Awful good of you to bring 'em." Then, to Miss Alathea in explanation: "Things I bought yesterday, Miss 'Lethe, all by myself. Jus' went wild. Reckon I'll let you an' th' Colonel see 'em." She took a large, dressed doll out of its wrappings. "Look at that!"

"What a beauty!" cried the Colonel.

"Can talk, too." Madge pressed the wondrous puppet's shirred silk chest. "Ma-ma," it cried. "Ma-ma."

"Never had nothin' but a rag-doll, myself," the girl went on, delighted by their approval of this automatic wonder. "'Tain't for me. It's for a little girl as lives up in th' mountings."

From the doll she turned to an amazing jumping-jack, the next treasure taken from the packages. She pulled the toy's animating strings and watched its antics with delight. "Mos' as lively as a Kentucky Colonel climbin' a tree," said she, and laughed roguishly at the horseman. "Oh, I heard of it; I heard of it."

The Colonel tried in vain to protest, Madge's laughter kept up merrily, as she took an old-fashioned carpet-sack from quite the biggest of the bundles and began to pack her purchases in it, until the Colonel and Miss Alathea left the room, gaily protesting at her ridicule.

Instantly all of the signs of high elation vanished from the girl's face. She drooped. Left alone, it quickly became plain that her recent animation had been forced, unreal. "Well I guess I'd better not open up th' other bundles," she said listlessly. "I'll pack 'em as they be. It's time I started too. I'm goin' back to the mountings." Softly she hummed the air the darkies had been singing when she came into the room.

"Weep no more, my lady, oh, weep no more to-day, I will sing one song of my old Kentucky home, Then my old Kentucky home, good-night!"

There was infinite pathos in her half-unconscious rendition of the plaintive, darkey melody. To the mountain girl the moment was full of sadness. She had come down from her mountains to save the man she loved from the assassin's bullet and had saved him, not from that alone, but from a crushing blow to hope and fortune. Her work was done. All that now was left to her was to go back to her little cabin, hiding the secret of her love for him in her sore heart, enshrining, there, the memory of every minute she had ever passed with him as holy memories to comfort her in days to come. Melancholy thoughts pressed on her hard.

Frank entered.

He stopped short in the doorway, looking with amazement at her work of packing for departure.

"Why, Madge!" said he. "What does this mean? Packing up! Surely you're not going away!" There was a thrill of real distress in his pleasant, vibrant voice which comforted her.

"Yes, I'm going back to th' mountings. I was ... goin' afore, but I couldn't miss that hoss-race."

"Madge," he cried impulsively, "you must not and you shall not go. I cannot bear to think of you wasting your life in the lonely mountains. Madge, your land will make you rich, and with your brightness you could study and learn. Education will make you an ornament to any society."

She shook her head. "As fur as I can see," said she, "society ain't what it is cracked up to be. I don't seem to have no hankerin' after it. Oh, o' course, I'd like to have all this softness an' pootiness around me, always; I'd like to go out in th' world an' see th' wonders as I've heard of; but I don't think that 'u'd satisfy me. I'd still be hankerin' an' thirstin' arter somethin' that I couldn't have. There's been a feelin' in my heart, ever sence I come here, that'll take th' air o' th' mountings to cl'ar away. Like enough, up there among th' wild things that love me, amongst th' rocks an' hills, I'll find th' rest an' peace I ain't had since I come away."

The youth looked at her with wide, worried eyes. He had not thought the situation out in any very careful detail; but he had, at no time, contemplated her immediate departure. Now that it seemed imminent it brought his feelings to a focus, showed him, instantly, that he could not bear to have this mountain maiden who had done so much for him thus vanish from his life. A realization that he loved her deeply, tenderly, unchangeably rushed over him. That she was a child of nature, uneducated and unaccustomed to the world he knew became a matter of but small importance to him as he stood there watching her, while, sadly but deliberately, she kept on with her work of packing in the carpet-bag her small possessions and the many gifts which she had purchased in the city for the children of her "mountings." That the world which he had ever thought his world might laugh at her and ridicule him if he married her he knew, but, suddenly, this seemed of little consequence. The errors in her education could be readily corrected and her heart and instincts were more nearly right, already, than those of any lowland girl whom he had ever known.

"Madge," he cried, "I cannot give you up! I love you!"

The girl's hands stopped their busy work among the bundles. Her cheeks paled and her lips parted to a gasping little intake of breath. It had not, once, occurred to her modest, self-sacrificing mind that, even as the bluegrass gentleman had found her heart and taken it forever and forever to be his own, no matter where she was or how great might the distance be which separated them, so, also, had his heart really and forever passed to her, the simple, unlettered and untrained little maiden of the wilderness. It seemed impossible, incredible.

"You love me!"

"Yes, I love you as I never have, as I never can love any other woman. Madge, dearest, I want you for my wife!"

The great desire, the certainty that if he did not win her then all other triumphs would be empty, meaningless, had come suddenly upon him, but it had come with overwhelming force. His voice was vibrant with a passion which surprised himself.

"No, no; it can never be!" she said tremulously. Her heart was in a turmoil, her hands trembled with excitement. Ah, it was hard for her to put away from her the brilliant vista which had opened there before her startled eyes! But she was sure that she must do it; that if she loved this man she must forswear him for his own dear sake. What right had she, a mountain-girl, to come down there to the bluegrass to shame him in the face of friends and foes by her ignorance and awkwardness? Her heart yearned toward him with a warmth and fervor which she had not known as possible to human longings, but—no, no, for his sake she must give him up, as, for his sake, she had made the long, desperate journey from the mountains to save him from Joe Lorey's bullet, as, for his sake, shrinking and dismayed, conscious that in doing it she might very well be sacrificing his respect for her, she had donned the blouse and breeches of a jockey, yesterday, to ride his mare to victory when none other had been there to save the day for him. That had been a sacrifice almost beyond the power of words to tell—a sacrifice of modesty; now came an even greater one, but one which, none the less, must certainly be made. "No, no," said she again, "it can never, never be!"

"But I want you—just as you are! What do I care for the world, without you, or for what it says, so long as you are mine?"

A flood of bitterness rushed to her heart. Ah, why, why, had fate made it so necessary that, to save him, she must do what, yesterday, she had been forced to do!

"You're thinkin' of my ignorance, an' such," she said, with sad eyes bent upon the gifts which, now, although she looked at them, she did not see and had forgotten. "But there's more nor that as stands between us, Mr. Frank."

"You mean you don't love me?"

"No, no; oh, what air th' use o' denyin' it? I love you! It's that—it's that that drives me from you, an' that breaks—my—heart!"

He went close to her and tried to take her hands in his. "Madge, dear," he said softly, "I want you to listen to me. I tell you I shall not let any foolish pride or any fears for the future stand in the way of our happiness. When I thought, a moment ago, that I might lose you forever, I saw what my life would be without you; and, now that I know you love me, nothing shall come between us. Madge, dear heart, I want you to put your hand in mine."

She drew away, but it was plain that she was sorely tempted. "Ah, if I only dared!" said she.

"Come, Madge, darling!" he said fervently, opening his arms to fold her to his heart.

"No, no," she said, "it wouldn't be right." The Colonel's words: "We'd think it an eternal shame and a disgrace for one of our women to ride a race in a costume such as you have on," rang in her mind and filled her with despair. "The Colonel said—" she began, weakly.

"Oh, damn the Colonel!" Frank cried angrily, wondering why any one should meddle with his heart-affairs.

And as he spoke the Colonel entered hurriedly, evidently bearing news of import.

Startled by the young man's earnest words, he stopped short in astonishment. "Why—what's that, sir?" he exclaimed amazed, and then, seeing clearly that he had broken in upon a fervent sentimental situation and unwilling to believe that Frank could really have meant him when he had been so emphatic, turned his thoughts, again, to the news which had brought him in such haste.

"I say," he said, excitedly, "I've been cross-examining that rascal, Ike, and I've found out who smuggled the whiskey to him."

"Who was it?" Madge and Frank cried almost in unison.

"That double-distilled, three-ply scoundrel, Horace Holton," said the Colonel, angrily.

"Holton!" Frank exclaimed. "I wouldn't have believed it!"

"I would," Madge commented.

"I'll find him and settle with him for it!" Frank angrily exclaimed.

"I'm afraid that's easier said than done," the Colonel answered, "but I'm with you, and we'll do our best."

Through the windows came the noise of baying hounds. It instantly attracted their attention, as it ever will that of Kentuckians. "What's that? A fox-hunt?"

Frank had hurried to the window and was looking out. "No," he answered, in incredulous amazement, "it's Holton and his gang. They're hunting Joe Lorey with dogs!"

Madge hurried to his side, distressed beyond the power of words to tell. "Oh, oh!" she cried. "They're coming this way, and—and—who's that?"

As she spoke Joe Lorey dashed up, breathless to the window.



CHAPTER XIX

The moonshiner stood there, pathetic in his beaten strength before them.

"They're huntin' me with dogs!" he said. "They're goin' to string me up without justice or mercy!"

Madge hurried to his side. "Joe, they shan't do it!" she exclaimed, and took his hand.

"It'll take more nor you to save me, little one," he said, and smiled down at her pitifully. "There's no hope for me, now. That's why I've come hyar, to say to you all, afore I die, that I am innocent o' firin' th' stable." He threw back his shoulders and stood before them, impressive and convincing. "Afore God, I am innocent!"

Frank looked at him with eyes which, as they gazed, altered their expression. He had thought the man quite possibly guilty of a vicious act—a foul attempt to burn a helpless animal in order to obtain revenge upon the man who owned her. But as he gazed he could not doubt that he was speaking simple truth. "Joe," he said impulsively, "I believe you!"

Joe turned to him with gratitude plain upon his face. "You believe me—arter all that's passed?" He looked straight into the eyes of the young man he had hated, with a searching, earnest gaze. "Then," he said, after a second's pause, "I believe as what you said, that night, war true. It war never you as ruined me." He held his hand out to the man whom, not so long ago, he had wished, with all his heart, to kill.

Frank grasped it with a hearty grip, just as the terrifying baying of the hounds approached the house.

"Frank, they're coming here!" the Colonel cried, excited.

Joe turned away from Frank, looking here and there like a hunted animal. "Oh, it's hard to die afore I've met Lem Lindsay!" he said hopelessly. It was quite plain that he considered his fate sealed.

Even as he spoke Holton and half-a-dozen others sprang to the broad gallery which fronted the whole room. Holton was plainly the leader of the party, for when he motioned all the others back, they obeyed his signal without protest, while he, himself, peered eagerly in through a wide, open window.

Frank, angered beyond measure by this bold intrusion, would have sprung toward him, to attack him, had not the Colonel waved him back.

"Frank, my boy," said he, "keep cool, keep cool!"

As he spoke, without apology, Holton stepped through the window into the room, itself.

"Layson," he said curtly, "I'm a committee o' one to ask if you'll turn over that man, an' make no trouble." He jerked a thumb toward Joe.

Layson was wrathful at the man's intrusion; he had been impressed by what the fugitive had said. "No," he answered, hotly. "Joe Lorey's in my house, under my protection, and, by the eternal, you shan't lay a hand on him!"

The Colonel smiled, delighted. "Kentucky blood!" he cried. "I'll back you to a finish!"

He ranged himself by Frank, and Madge, as belligerent as either of them, hurried, also, to his side.

"I'm with you, Colonel," she exclaimed, with the spirit of the mountain-bred, "and we'll win ag'in, as we did once before!"

Joe saw this with distress. Layson's generosity had softened him. He knew, perfectly, by this time, that Madge was not for him, and her spirit in joining his defenders—the very men whom he had thought his enemies—touched him deeply. The realization came to him with a quick rush that he had wronged the bluegrass folk whom he had hated with such bitterness. He looked first at those who wished to take him prisoner and make him suffer for a crime of which he was not guilty, and then at his defenders, who had every reason to doubt him, but still, without a question, had accepted his own plea of innocence. He had already made these people trouble. Now was his opportunity to save them from an awkward situation and, perhaps, a perilous one. There might be shooting if he offered to resist or let these good friends attempt to defend him. That would endanger them, and, worse, endanger Madge. "I'll go. I don't want to make no trouble," he said hastily.

Holton nodded with approval. He wished to take the man as quickly and as simply as he could. Every complication which could be avoided would make less probable discovery of the fact that he, himself, and not the fugitive young mountaineer, was the real culprit.

"That's sensible," he said, "for them men, out thar, are bound to hev you, by fair means or foul."

"Those men will listen to reason," Frank said with a determination which disconcerted the ex-slave dealer. "They shall hear me!" He stepped toward the open window. "Colonel, come with me." Without waiting for him he stepped to the gallery outside.

The Colonel started to go also, but, seeing that Holton, too, was about to hurry out, paused long enough to go up to him threateningly. "Don't you dare to follow!" he warned him. "We'll play this hand alone." The man fell back and the Colonel kept his eyes on him as, slowly, he joined Frank on the gallery.

Holton's discomfiture lasted but a moment. As soon as the Colonel had passed out of sight he got his wits back and looked threateningly at Madge and the mountaineer. "We'll see about that," he declared viciously, and, making a movement of his hand which indicated that he must be armed, although he had not shown a weapon, so far, moved toward another window which also opened on the gallery.

But he had not counted on old Neb. The darkey found in this emergency the opportunity for which he had been waiting many years. Lapse of time had never dulled his keen resentment of the blow the man had struck him; now it was with keen delight that he stepped out of the shadow just outside the window, with a carelessly held pistol in his hand, which somehow appeared to cover Holton. "De Cunnel said you'd please stay heah, suh," he said placidly; but the pistol gave his words an emphasis which could not be mistaken.

Holton paled with rage, but did not take another forward step.

As he fell back Joe Lorey spoke. The murmur of the mob outside, incited, he well knew, to hunger for his life, and the loud voices of the Colonel and of Frank, raised in expostulation, made an accompaniment for what he had to say to Holton, and that he still was in grave danger made his attitude more menacing, his words more impressive.

"Yes," he said to Holton, while Madge gazed, spellbound, "you hold on. I've a word to say to you."

"Say it, then, and say it quick," said Holton, trying to make his tone contemptuous.

"I'll say it quick, and I'll say it plain. You know as it war never me as fired that stable. You war there an' saw me leave afore th' fire. It's yer place to cl'ar me. Why air you a-houndin' me to my death?"

Holton was uncomfortable. "Them men out thar believe ye guilty. It ain't my work," he said.

The mountaineer was not deceived. He knew this man to be his enemy, although he knew no reason for his hatred. "It's you as air settin' 'em on," he said, "as you set me on Frank Layson when you told me that lie ag'in him in th' mountings."

Madge had listened, speechless, during this dramatic scene, but stood watching it, alert and ready to lend aid to her friend, if opportunity arose. Now, at Joe's words, she started forward.

"Was it him as told you?" she inquired, amazed.

Joe did not answer her, but continued to face Holton and address him. "I believed you," he went on, "because I thought you couldn't a-knowed o' th' still except through him; but since he never told you, it air proof to me that you have been in these here mountings, sometime, afore." Strange suspicions were glittering from his hostile eyes as he faced the now thoroughly alarmed man who, a moment since, had been the blustering bully.

"I tell you I were never thar!" said Holton hurriedly.

"Then how did you know of th' cave an' the oak?" said Joe, accusingly. The glitter of suspicion in his eyes was growing brighter every second. "It's plain to me as how you've passed many a day thar in them mountings. Thar's somethin' bound up in yer past as has egged you on ag'in me. I wants to know what that thing is—I wants to know just who an' what ye air!"

"It's easy enough to show who Horace Holton is," the man said, blustering, but he was very ill at ease. "What do I care what you want?" And then he made a slip. "You can't bring no proof—" he began, but caught himself.

Madge had been watching him with new intentness. The excitement of the moment may have sharpened the girl's wits, or, possibly, its hint of peril may have brought to Holton's face some detail of expression, which, during recent weeks, had not before appeared upon it.

"But I kin," she said, slowly. "I war right in what I thought when I first saw you in th' mountings. I had seen your face afore!"

"Don't you dare say that!" cried Holton, stepping toward her angrily. The man who had been the accuser, was, strangely, now, quite plainly, half at bay.

"That look ag'in!" the girl said, studying his face. "That look war printed on my baby brain!"

"Silence, I say!" cried Holton, now badly frightened. He had not counted on this recognition.

"Never!" the girl said boldly. She was certain, now, as she looked at him, that the suspicion which had flashed into her mind was accurate. Her cheeks paled and she stepped toward him with set face, clenched hands. Every fibre in her thrilled with horror of him, every drop of blood in her young body cried for vengeance on him. "I'll rouse th' world ag'in ye!" she exclaimed, so tensely that even Lorey looked at her with alarmed amazement. "I'll rouse th' world ag'in ye, for I'm standin' face to face with my own father's murderer—Lem Lindsay!"

"Lem Lindsay!" said Joe, wonderingly, and then, with the expression on his face of a wild-beast about to spring upon his prey: "At last!"

Holton shrank away from them in terror which he could not hide. His bravado was all gone. He was, no longer, the accuser, but, with the mention of that name, had changed places with Joe Lorey and become the fugitive, shrinking, alarmed.

"'Sh! Don't speak that name!" he pleaded. He made no effort at denial. There was that in the girl's eyes which told him that her recognition had been absolute. "I've been hidin' it for years." He spoke pleadingly. "Look hyar. I've got everythin' that heart can wish. Joe Lorey, I'll save you from them men. I'll sw'ar I saw you leave the stable afore th' fire begun." He moved his eyes from one of the accusing faces to the other, terrified. "I'll make ye both rich if you'll never speak that name ag'in!"



"Your weight in gold would make no differ!" Joe cried menacingly. "Lem Lindsay, it air Heaven's work that's given you into my hands!" He went toward him slowly, menacingly, with his strong fingers working with desire to clutch his shrinking throat. "It air Heaven's will as you should meet your fall through Ben Lorey's son!"

Holton, desperate, gathered courage for a last effort to escape from the net which he had woven to his own undoing. With a quick movement he drew from his belt, where his long coat had concealed its presence, hitherto, a gleaming knife, and, with it upraised, rushed at Joe viciously. "I'm a free man, yet," he cried, "an' I'm a-goin' to stay free!"

Joe, alert, calm-eyed, cool-witted, waited for him with a hand upraised to catch his wrist, with muscles braced to meet the fierce attack.

Madge rushed to the window, calling loudly: "Colonel! Mr. Frank!"

But Holton and Joe Lorey were, by that time, locked in a desperate grip and struggling with the energy of men battling for their lives. Twisting and straining, each striving with the last ounce of energy within him to get the better of the other, they plunged across the room and out into the hall.

Just as Frank and the Colonel hurried in, a shot was heard and then a heavy fall. An instant later Joe came to the door.

"Heaven's will are done!" he said, quite simply.

Layson rushed toward him, but paused, aghast, looking off through the open door. "Joe, you've killed him!" he exclaimed.

"An' I had a right!" said Joe, now strangely calm. "When he killed my father it were ordained that he should fall by my hands. I ain't afeared to stand my trial."

"The men outside have promised," Layson said, dismayed by this new and terrible complication, "that you shall have a fair trial on the other charge. They've gone, now, for the sheriff. But this charge," he looked toward the door which led into the hall, "will be more serious!"

"I can clear him of 'em both," said Madge. "I'll sw'ar th' killin' was in self-defense; I'll sw'ar that Holton owned, before me, that he saw Joe leave th' stable afore th' fire."

"He saw him!" exclaimed Frank, astonished. "What was Holton doing there?"

"Oh, don't you see?" said Madge. "He war your enemy—th' man as told Joe th' lie ag'in you in th' mountings, th' man as tried to burn Queen Bess."

The Colonel had entered, quickly, from the gallery, and stood listening, amazed and fascinated. Now, after a moment's pause to think the matter out, he advanced to Joe with outstretched hand. For the man who had been guilty of that vile mischief he felt no regret, for the man who had, in a fair fight and with good reason, shot him down, he felt full sympathy. "Tried to burn Queen Bess!" he cried. "Joe, the jury'll clear you without leaving their seats! Come, my boy—the sheriff's here, and you will have to go with him; but don't you worry. I'll see you through."

Joe stood, thinking, with bowed head and frowning brow. Suddenly he looked up and cast his eyes about upon the company. "Before I goes, I wants to say a word to Madge," said he, and turned to her with an impressive earnestness. "Little one, don't you never fret about me, no more." He took her hand and she gave it to him gladly. "I see, now, as you was never made for me." He took a step toward Frank and led her to him. "I see whar your heart is, an' I puts your hand in his." With bowed head he relinquished the brown hand of the mountain-girl whom he had loved since childhood, to the outstretched hand of the young "foreigner," whom he no longer looked at with the hatred which had so long thrilled his heart. "And—now I says good-bye. God bless you both!"

He went out, slowly, with the Colonel.

"Madge, he's right," said Frank, "this little hand is mine."

He would have clasped her in his arms, but, finally, she held him off.

"No, no," said she, "not till you know my secret. It was I who rode Queen Bess,"

"You rode Queen Bess!"

The Colonel was re-entering the room. "But the world will never know it," he said gallantly, "on the honor of a Kentuckian."

Frank's smile was radiant. "If it did, I should say: 'Here, Madge, in my arms, is your shelter from the world.'" He drew her to him gently. "Madge, my little wife!"

THE END