Page:Man's Country (1923).pdf/145

 ness—a little lack of assurance—was almost a charm.

George Judson was having his chance at last; and appeared quite well equipped to make the most of it. Since his high school days he had not ceased to keep up the habit of cultural reading—history, essays, science, philosophy, the masterpieces of fiction—and maintained a certain acquaintance with what was being said ia the smarter periodicals. Seldom had a day been so long or so wearing that he did not rest his mind and feed it with some nibblings from a book or worth-while magazine. This enabled him to talk well. He danced acceptably and played a passable hand at bridge. But what commended him to the younger set was that he was a jolly devil and went in for sports. He rode, he golfed, he played tennis, and pulled an oar on the river.

Fay Gilman was fond of equestrian exercise and took it quite regularly at stated hours. "Oh, what a beautiful horse!" she exclaimed one day, as a dappled sorrel with a flash of white in the face went single-footing by. "And what a perfect rider!" Her eyes turned to follow him.

She did not know that this was a moment the rider had lived for calculatingly; that he had combed the Mississippi Valley for the handsomest of the colts of Artist Montrose, a beautiful horse he had seen at a County Fair some-

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