CHAPTER VI.
The clubhouse at Cawnpore was crowded on the evening before the races.
Up to eleven o'clock it had been comparatively deserted, for there was scarcely a bungalow in the station at which dinner parties were not going on; but, after eleven, the gentlemen for the most part adjourned to the club for a smoke, a rubber, or a game of billiards, or to chat over the racing events of the next day.
Loud greetings were exchanged as each fresh contingent arrived, for many newcomers had come into the station only that afternoon.

Every table in the whist room was occupied, black pool was being played in the billiard room upstairs, where most of the younger men were gathered, while the elders smoked and talked in the rooms below.
"What will you do, Bathurst ?" the Doctor asked his guest, after the party from the Major's had been chatting for some little time downstairs.

"Would you like to cut in at a rubber or take a ball at pool ?" "Neither, Doctor; they are both accomplishments beyond me; I have not patience for whist, and I can't play billiards in the least.

I have tried over and over again, but I am too nervous, I fancy; I break down over the easiest stroke--in fact, an easy stroke is harder for me than a difficult one.

I know I ought to make it, and just for that reason, I suppose, I don't." "You don't give one the idea of a nervous man, either, Bathurst." "Well, I am, Doctor, constitutionally, indeed terribly so." "Not in business matters, anyhow," the Doctor said, with a smile.