"
"How is Lord Barminster?" she inquired.
"Splendid."
"Lady Constance also well?"--with the slightest tinge of restraint in
her voice.
"Yes," he answered indifferently; adding, "but you haven't asked after
'King Cole.'"
"Ah, no, but you would have told me at first if anything had been wrong
with him."
Leroy smiled. He knew that to be true.
"He will win, you think?" she asked anxiously.
"Oh, yes!" was the careless reply. "Vermont says there is nothing to
touch him."
The countess raised her eyebrows.
"You trust this Vermont with a great deal, Adrien. Your horses, your
wine, and your legal business. He must be a wonderful man."
"Yes," he answered confidently. "Jasper's a treasure. Nothing comes
amiss to him. I should be in my grave if I had to face half the worries
he wrestles with daily. Come," he added, as the first bars of the new
waltz floated from the gallery; and with a sigh of enjoyment she rose
for the promised dance.
"No one's step suits me like yours," she breathed, when they paused for
rest. "Adrien, shall I back 'King Cole' for another two hundred?"
The two sentences were, perhaps, rather incongruous, but curiously
characteristic of her ladyship; for, in addition to a natural love of
intrigue, she had a partiality for betting on the turf and speculation
on 'Change--both, of course, sub rosa.
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