Some were in sun-bonnets, others in their
best Sunday headdress. Some had kilted their skirts high. Others were
all dishevelled with the ardour of the race. The leader--a gaunt
figure with spoon held rigidly before her, with white stockinged legs,
and a truly magnificent stride--had come and passed before Tilda could
believe her eyes. After a long interval three others tottered by in a
cluster. The fifth dropped her egg and collapsed beside it, to be
hauled to her feet and revived by the stewards amid inextinguishable
laughter from the crowd. In all, fourteen competitors rolled in, some
with empty ladles, some laughing and protesting that not a step farther
could they stir. But, long before the crowd closed in, Tilda saw the
winner breast a glimmering line of tape stretched at the end of the
course, and heard the shouts saluting her victory.
"But who is it?"
"Miss Sally!"
"Miss Sally, if ever you heard the like! . . . But there! blood will
tell."
"It's years since I seen her," said a woman.
"You don't say! Never feared man nor devil, my mother used to tell.
An' to run in a race along with the likes of Jane Pratt! But you never
can reckon wi' the gentry--what they'll do, or what they won't.
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