KATES DAY WITH THE OLD HORSE 213 



seen more of the seamy and shabby side of life 

 than she had even guessed at in the twenty sunny 

 years which went before. 



I don't think the squire has any suspicion of it, 

 and Kate has neither mother nor sister to tell it to, 

 but her poor little heart has had its stoutness tried 

 a good deal of late. When Kate was queen at the 

 Hall, gallant George Vernon, somewhile captain of 

 Hussars, and at present master of the hounds and 

 Kate's very distant cousin, had remembered the tie 

 of kinship to the bright young beauty quite as 

 often as duty required. Now his visits were like 

 angel's visits in number and, to the proud Kate, 

 far less welcome. 



George Vernon was no snob, but then Kate, the 

 hostess at the Hall, the reigning queen in the 

 hunting-field, and Kate without a horse to her 

 name, in a cottage and out of the world altogether, 

 were very different persons, and George uncon- 

 sciously showed that he felt the change. Though 

 man is fickle, perhaps George would not have 

 allowed his admiration for his cousin to cool so 

 suddenly had there not been attractions else- 

 where. 



Miss Preece (the daughter of the new tenant at 

 the Hall) would have passed as a pretty woman 

 anywhere. If lemon-coloured locks, an abundant 



