The Professor passed his hand lightly over his face, touching it in three places. He always did this when his attention was required, and many people thought he was crossing himself, and unjustly suspected him of ritualistic tendencies. "Yes, my dear?" he inquired. "Nothing unpleasant, I hope?" Turning to the glass he looked apprehensively at his sister's reflection, and was discomfited when she caught him. "Quite the reverse," she said. "It's this: I'm going to buy and race some Trotting horses!" And now, thought she, for a homily on sport and the evils of the turf! But she was disappointed. "Why specify the horse with a superfluous adjective?" he inquired. "All horses trot, don't they? It is their natural pace--or one of them. Try to be accurate, my dear girl." Gay laughed pityingly. "Trotting horses are a distinct breed, old boy," she said, "and they trot against each other for prizes; _trot_, you understand, or pace--there are square-gaited horses--those that trot like a cab-horse, only faster, you know--and pacers, which move both legs on the same side in unison. Like this, you know"--she got up from her chair, and tried to illustrate her meaning by walking across the room, moving the right arm and right leg together, repeating the performance on the left side. Frank Lawless looked on with suddenly awakened scientific interest. "I was under the impression that only giraffes moved in that way," he said. "Surely horses cannot go very fast with an action like that?" "Fast enough to do a mile in one minute fifty-five seconds or less, anyway," Gay replied. "It is such a pretty sight to watch, they wear such funny boots sometimes, and hobbles and sheepskins, and--and--things," she finished lamely for want of more knowledge regarding pacers' equipment. "Ah, yes, quite so," Frank Lawless agreed, "but--er--racing, you know. My experience of it has been limited, I confess, (the Professor's knowledge of racing was confined to two or three occasional turfites who came to him professionally), but I am given to understand that its followers are, to say the least of it, unscrupulous. I am not a prig, Gay, but I have seen life in my time"--he looked at himself knowingly in the glass, while Gay laughed inwardly--"and I flatter myself I am a man of the world, therefore I fear I cannot give my consent to your proposal." The last remark was uttered with all the timidity of an assumed authority, and as he spoke, he lapsed into the one-legged attitude which had earned him his nickname.