struck me as rational-certainly most cheerful philosophy. First of all, I decided, Tragressor was not the sort of person who would be bowled over at first shot by a girl of Dodo Curzon's type, attractive as she undeniably was. He was a man of the world, accustomed to English and probably Continental society. He knew his way about, as they say on the other side. As for Dodo, she had a forthright view of life and common-sense was her long suit. So, all in all, I didn't intend to be run out of this thing without raising my hand. I wasn't as good a loser as all that.

Accordingly, some time after dinner I motored to Overbrook, ostensibly to see how Dodo had recovered from the shock, but in reality to give notice to all concerned that I was still very much in the ring.

Tragressor, as I had suspected, was installed, quite at home. He sat in a huge wicker chair on the side veranda, smoking a cigarette and lazily smiling at Dodo, seated near by, busily plying her knitting-needles. He glanced at me cordially enough.

"Ah, Toler," he said.

It takes an Englishman of Tragressor's sort to establish atmosphere. Thoroughly poised, elegantly nonchalant, gracefully detached, impeccably garbed, he converted that veranda into a scene from a Henry Arthur Jones comedy. He had so thrilled the footman that there was a new rigidity in his demeanor, as though at last the young cockney had encountered something in America worthy of his powers; he had inspired Adelia Curzon to flights hitherto unattained, and she played up to her guest with the faultless precision of a grande dame who wore the purple by right of heritage. She was a new person to me, utterly. So was Curzon with his drum-major dignity. Dodo alone was perfectly natural, and that Tragressor was delighted to have her thus was unmistakably suggested in his manner. Knowing her as well as I did, I could see she was not overly pleased at my advent, but, of course, she was civil enough.

The urbanity of the mother, however, was the worst possible sign, so far as my prospects were concerned. All in all,

my stock of cheerful philosophy didn't last five minutes.

"Philip," she purred, "we were so sorry you got away. I wanted you to dine with us. Captain Tragressor, I'm afraid, found us rather stupid-"

"Oh, come, Mrs. Curzon!" Tragressor waved his cigarette and laughed with a significance designed to show just how remote even the slightest element of stupidity had been.

I expressed all proper concern, and then turned to Dodo with the rather soulful confession of gratification at her escape from injury. She threw it off lightly. She had not even been scratched, she said.

"That's bully. You know you've drawn me as a partner for those silly stunts at the pony gymkhana to-morrow afternoon."

"Yes, of course.' She gazed at me curiously. "I called up and entered Captain Tragressor. Mr. Edgar, however, seems to be doubtful about a partner for him."

My cue, plainly enough, was to meet the tacit suggestion by begging permission to withdraw as her partner in favor of Tragressor. But I let the hint go over my head, replying carelessly that he would no doubt find some one.

"You know partners are always turning up at the last moment," I added. 'Oh yes. She faced Captain Tragressor with a shrug and thereafter gave him her undivided attention.

As soon as I decently could I departed, running down to the Hempfield Club in the village, where I sat around with several of the crowd until midnight. Curious isn't it how interest in a girl spoils a man for the ordinary indoor male pursuits-at least until after he has been married awhile. For months past almost everything in the way of diversion had been done either with Dodo Curzon or with Dodo in mind. I hadn't realized how boresome and stupid a gang of chaps could be with their arguments and badinage, their long silences, the ordering of fresh highballs, and all that sort of worn-out rot. But I knew I wouldn't sleep, so I stuck it out to the last.

The gymkhana was got up in behalf of the Belgian relief fund, a rather picturesque and ofttimes thrilling series

of feats performed on the back of a hunter or polo mount.

When I arrived at the field Tragressor and Dodo, who had ridden overthe Britisher quite characteristically mounted on that ill-omened beast, Hector-were already on hand, while Curzon and his wife sat in their motor, one of at least a hundred or more cars that lined one side of the arena. Mamma Curzon had done her work well, beyond doubt, and Tragressor was the cynosure of all eyes. Try as the committee would, they had been unable to dig up a partner for the man-although more than one girl, I thought, cast baleful eyes at the partner who had been so gauche as to keep his assignment when such an extraordinary cavalier was going begging. I didn't look at Dodo-I didn't have the hardihood to face her Minervaesque disapproval, not even after the committee, abandoning the search for a partner,

did Tragressor the honor of adding him to the list of judges.

All in all, I was thrown completely off my chump and I knew that Dodobarely gracious to me was extremely distrait. In the musical stall feature for women, which she should have won, being the most proficient horsewoman and having the best-trained mount, she put up a ridiculous exhibition and was the only rider who had not been placed when the final whistle blew.

Then, in the ancient and honorable game of spearing brass rings, a male specialty, I not only missed the first ring and the second, but ran my bamboo pole full against the cross-bar of the third rack, shivering the lance and toppling over the flimsy structure. Tragressor was near by as I plunged past and incontinently I glanced at him, looking for the smile of derision. But his face was expressionless.

"Fine, Phil!" jeered Hal Larendon, who had never sat on a horse in his life and was now leaning over the wheel of his automobile. "Why don't you charge a barn the next time!"

Every one was laughing, of course. Ordinarily I shouldn't have minded at all, since my reputation was that of a rather fair horseman and I had a threegoal handicap at polo, but this day of all days the gibes got under my skin and added to my discomfiture. Inwardly cursing everything and everybody, I stole a glance at Dodo as we lined up for the Gretna Green stakes. Her face was a study; but then she had nothing on me in that respect if my features reflected my feelings.

In the Gretna Green stunt, as most, perhaps, know, a couple dash from the starting-point to a table a hundred yards or so distant. Arriving at this point, the man dismounts, writes his name and that of the woman who has accompanied him, on a pad, remounts, and, seizing the hand of his partner, the two gallop home-always a very thrilling and picturesque feature.

Two of the couples preceding Dodo and me had made extraordinary time and it was decidedly up to us to retrieve ourselves.

"Phil," she muttered, unsmiling, "let's buck up and really try to put this over."

"I buck up!" I glared at her. about you?"

"I said we.

"How

But never mind." She jerked her reins impatiently.

We tore off at the crack of the pistol and ramped up to the table, where I threw myself to the ground in gallant style, holding the reins with my left hand and with the other scribbling our names, Dodo in the mean time impatiently calling for me to hurry.

I

I

Vaulting to the back of my pony, reached out and grasped Dodo's fingers, and as I did so she cut her mount with her crop. The beast leaped forward before my pony had got started. should have let go her hand, or she mine; I never could determine which was at fault. At all events, she was dragged cleanly from the saddle and went to earth heavily. As I glanced downward I saw, to my horror, one of the rear hoofs

of her pony descending upon her head. But she was rolling, and the steel-shod mass just grazed her hair.

She lay still for a moment, while I took a flying leap from my_pony and ran to her. But it was Tragressor, again, who was there first, the leader of a group who had rushed out on the field. He was helping the girl to her feet, and she was laughing gamely enough and declaring that she was absolutely uninjured. As I came up Tragressor turned to me, and I braced defiantly, even belligerently, expecting something such as "clumsy ass, or the like. But his expression was of vast relief.

"She's quite all right,” he said. "I'm a fine mess," I replied, bitterly, not knowing what else to say.

He smiled, and a beautiful smile it was. "Oh no, not at all, old fellow! Accidents will happen, don't you know." There was your real British sportsman as you find him the world over-British sportsmen of the Tragressor sort, I

mean.

Relieved, but by no means cheered, I broke through the circle to present my regrets to Dodo. But Mother Curzon held the center of the stage. Her manner suggested to me that her agitation. was due more to the fact that the mishap had occurred in Tragressor's presence than anything else.

"Two falls in two days!" she was saying, reproachfully. "Dodo, really I think you had better give up riding if you cannot stay on a horse's back."

"It is going rather strong," laughed the girl, pushing a wisp of her corncolored hair from her forehead. "I hadn't had a tumble in years-' "Nonsense, Dodo! I pulled you off," said I. "And if—”

But Adelia Curzon broke in with a command that she retire from further events of the day. When Tragressor threw the weight of his influence upon the woman's side, Dodo yielded with pretty reluctance, while I, distinctly in a suicidal mood, cut the whole show and rode my pony over to the club stables to get him out of my sight.

As I was leaving the paddock for my motor-car, bent on driving somewhere east of nowhere in the shortest possible time, Penworthy, the first whipper-in,

who had been down to the village looking after a shipment of hounds, drove up in a buckboard. Penworthy was a thoroughly interesting and intelligent chap whose original recommendation with us had been his association with Lord Murgertroyd's famous pack in Kent. I nodded to him and was bending my course toward the club when I recalled the man's vast knowledge of English society and his studious attitude toward the war. Somewhat curious as to Tragressor, to whom I had now finally abandoned Dodo Curzon, I accosted him.

"Penworthy," I said, "did you ever know anything about Captain Tragressor of the British Army? I believe he was a crack polo-player."

The blue eyes in Penworthy's russetapple face took fire as he jumped from

the buckboard. "Polo-player! Indeed he was that, sir. And one of the best that ever sat on a horse, sir, in England. . . . He was a great loss. Aye, he was all of that."

"A loss!" I regarded the man strangely. "What do you mean, a loss?"

Penworthy, evidently looking for the sort of chaff that sometimes passes from master to man, blinked warily.

I gestured impatiently. "I'm perfectly serious, Pen. You spoke of him being a loss. Just what did you mean?"

He stared at me a moment. "Why, sir," he said at length, "if you're meaning Captain Reginald Tragressor, he was killed in the fighting on the Somme.' Reaching into his pocket, he drew forth. a pocket - book, taking therefrom a packet of clippings relating to the exploits and fate of prominent British horsemen in the war. Rapidly fingering over the excerpts, he handed me a cable despatch to the Times, yellow, creased, and worn by constant fingering.

Under date of some six months back it contained the official War Office announcement of the death by wounds of Capt. Reginald Tragressor of the Queen's Own in the culminating attack of the British at Thiepval.

Mental reactions are utterly beyond the range of human prevision. Show

me a person who can count upon his primary instinct in any given emergency and I'll show you either a falsifier or a superman. If the ticker suddenly and unexpectedly informs you that certain market affairs have gone your way, you are as liable to a strange and apparently causeless flush of irritation as to any more amiable emotion; conversely, first knowledge of a grievous cropper is

likely as not to strike a humorous chord such are the complexities of the human mind.

Personally, with this absolutely final evidence that Tragressor was an imposter in hand, with the practical assurance that I now but had to speak and cause a successful rival for a girl I cared for to slink ignominiously and finally out of sight, I experienced no thrill of exaltation. On the contrary, there was a profound melancholy. For Tragressor, frankly, had impressed me, impressed me deeply. He was big, and fine, and clean-cut, with a most captivating smile and an air of distinguished reserve-the sort of man whom all other men should admire because he was typical of the sex at its biggest and best.

With our second meeting at Overbrook had vanished all the antagonism and feeling of bitter rivalry which I had worked up in the course of my ride home on the day of the runaway. If you have any sense of fitness or proportion you cannot be jealous of a para

gon.

When the gods intervene mortals have no alternative to an attitude. more or less resignedly philosophical. Not that I was altogether so. Yet at the same time I could not condemn Dodo. I am not innately modest or shrinking; none the less, I should have been surprised had Tragressor's appeal to her been less obvious. So that now, with weapons in my hands, my first emotion was regret at the necessity which dictated their use. For, of course, they must be used and with deadly effectiveSo far as Dodo was concerned, it was the considerate, the kindly thing to do. And that was the only thing now to consider. Any thought of the possible effect of Tragressor's retirement on my own prospects would have been nothing short of puerile.

ness.

The Curzons were giving a dinner that evening. It had been arranged long before Tragressor was heard of, but naturally enough his presence gave to the coming function a fillip of zest to both host and guest. In my mood of somberness following the contretemps at