"It's just about these sports that I wanted to speak to you, Min," said the Professor with nervous haste. "The--ah--shocking exhibition my sister made of herself to-day--" "Wonderful driving for a beginner--won-der-ful!" said Min admiringly. "Did you ever hear such cheering? Trotting 'ud soon look up if you could get half-a-dozen Miss Gays to drive their own horses." "I don't believe that out of all England you'd find one other such immodest girl as my cousin," said Lossie, "or one family that would permit her to do what she did to-day." "How could I stop her?" cried the Professor irascibly. "I nearly had a fit when she appeared on the track." "You could have stopped it at the beginning," said Lossie sharply, "before she had ruined Carlton Mackrell's career, and made of herself a public scandal." "It must be a comfort to you, Miss Lossie," said Min silkily, "that _you_ hadn't enough influence with Mr. Mackrell to make him do anything wrong. He just worships Miss Gay, and when he found she had set her heart on the Gold Vase, why, he took care that she should get it, like the true lover that he is!" "This woman has always been a bad influence with Gay," Lossie said furiously to Frank, "and they make a combination that will be too strong for you, if you don't look out." "I came here to talk to Mr. Frank, not you," said Min equably. "My motto is, 'let every tub stand on its own bottom,' and if I were you, I'd try and get some beaux of my own, and not be always grabbing at Miss Gay's." "Insolent woman!" cried Lossie, with flashing eyes, but Min merely nodded in a maddening way, and said: "You always hated Miss Gay because all the men loved her--what one man likes, the rest mostly do, and perhaps if you could have got hold of _one_, Miss Lossie, others might have come along too. At present it looks as if you'll have to put up with poor Mr. Frank after all, for you can't live without plenty of money!" Having produced her effect, if the Professor's terror-struck face were to be trusted, Min proceeded to the discussion of the matter really in hand. "You want Miss Gay to give up Trotting," she said, addressing Frank quietly, "and now she hasn't Mr. Mackrell to help her, I think perhaps she'll be willing. But if you bully her, Mr. Frank, she'll go on with it just to defy you, for Miss Gay has got a temper and a will of her own, for all that she's the sweetest, and best, and prettiest little lady in the world." "What do you advise?" said the Professor quaveringly, for Min's reckless unveiling of Lossie's secret intentions towards himself (failing anyone else) had half-frightened him out of his senses.