Every day during the meeting when Miss Braxton was at the track Colonel Bill sought her out. Sometimes he had a chance for a long talk, but oftener he was forced to content himself with shorter interviews. More than once he noticed General Braxton join his daughter when he approached, and he found that old warrior's manner growing more and more cold. “He's a loser,” thought the Colonel, to whom it never for a moment occurred that his own presence might be disagreeable to any one. “A man oughtn't to bet when he can't stand a-losing,” he concluded, philosophically, and then he dismissed the matter from his mind. On the last day of the races, after waiting for an hour or more to speak alone to Miss Braxton, and finding her constantly guarded by her father, who looked fiercer than usual, Colonel Bill was finally compelled to join her as she and the General were leaving the grand-stand. She saw him coming, and stopped, a pleased look on her face. The General, with a frigid nod, moved on a few paces and left them together. “I have come to ask if I might call on you this evening, Miss Braxton,” said the Colonel, timidly, “if you have no other engagement.” “I shall be very glad indeed to have you call,” she replied, cordially, adding, with a smile, “You know, Lexington is not so wildly gay that we haven't ample time to see our friends.” As he walked away the Colonel thought he heard his name mentioned by General Braxton, and although the words were inaudible, the tone was sharp and commanding. He turned and glanced back. The girl's face was flushed, and she looked excited, something unusual to her self-contained, reposeful manner. As they moved out of hearing, the General was still talking with great earnestness, and a feeling of uneasiness began to oppress him. This feeling had not altogether departed when he galloped into Lexington that night, his long-tailed, white linen duster buttoned up to his chin, the brim of his soft black hat pulled down over his eyes. The Elms, a roomy old-fashioned house encircled by wide verandas, the home of the Braxtons for generations, was one of the landmarks of Lexington. A long stretch of lawn filled with shrubbery and clumps of trees protected its inmates from the city's dust and turmoil and almost concealed the house itself from view. The Colonel, to whom the Elms was perfectly well known, never drew rein till he was before it, and then, checking his horse so suddenly that a less intelligent animal would have turned a somersault, swung himself out of the saddle with the ease of one who had spent the greater part of his life there, fastened the bridle to a ring in a great oak-tree by the curbing, and opening the big iron gate, strode up the gravelled walk which wound through the shrubbery.