Violet Campion reined in her horse with a suddenness that made him chafe
indignantly, and leaned from the saddle to greet Olga, who had just
turned in at the Priory gates.

Olga was bicycling. She sprang from her machine, and reached up an
impetuous hand, as regardless of the trampling animal as its rider.

"Pluto is in a tiresome mood to-day," remarked his mistress. "I know he
won't be satisfied till he has had a good beating. Perhaps you will go
on up to the house while I give him a lesson."

"Oh, don't beat him!" Olga pleaded. "He's only fresh."

"No, he isn't. He's vicious. He snapped at me before I mounted. It's no
good postponing it. He'll have to have it." Violet spoke as if she were
discussing the mechanism of a machine. "You go on up the drive, my dear,
while I take him across the turf."

But Olga lingered. "Violet, really--I know he will throw you or bolt
with you. I wish you wouldn't."

Violet's laugh had a ring of scorn. "My dear child, if I were afraid of
that, I had better give up riding him altogether."

"I wish you would," said Olga. "He is much too strong for a woman to
manage."

Violet laughed again, this time with sheer amusement, and then, with
dark eyes that flashed in the sunlight, she slashed the animal's flank
with her riding-whip. He uttered a snort that was like an exclamation of