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226 had been put so as to give him no ground for refusal but timidity.

"You don't care to?" Avery taunted him deftly.

"Why don't you try it?" Harriet found herself saying to him.

He hesitated. She realized it was not timidity he was feeling; it was something deeper and stronger than that. It was fear; but so plainly it was not fear of bodily hurt that she moved instinctively toward him in sympathy. He looked swiftly at Avery, then at her, then away. He seemed to fear alike accepting or refusing to play; suddenly he made his decision.

"I'll play."

He started instantly away to the dressing-rooms; a few minutes later, when he rode onto the field, Harriet was conscious that, in some way, Eaton was playing a part as he listened to Avery's directions. Then the ball was thrown in for a scrimmage, and she felt her pulses quicken as Avery and Eaton raced side by side for the ball. Eaton might not have played polo before, but he was at home on horseback; he beat Avery to the ball but, clumsy with his mallet, he missed and overrode; Avery stroked the ball smartly, and cleverly followed through. But the next instant, as Eaton passed her, shifting his mallet in his hand, Harriet watched him more wonderingly.

"He could have hit that ball if he'd wanted to," she declared almost audibly to herself; and the impression that Eaton was pretending to a clumsiness which was not real grew on her. Donald Avery appointed himself to oppose Eaton wherever possible, besting him in every contest for the ball; but she saw that Donald now, though he took it upon himself to show all the