And then--before the impulse of flight to the bungalow had reached her
brain--the whole terrible disaster burst upon her. Like a monster of
destruction, that which had been a gurgling stream rose above its banks
in a mighty, brown flood, surged like an inrushing sea over the moonlit
compound, and swept down the valley, turning it into a whirling turmoil
of water.
XIV
HOW THE TALE WAS TOLD
Ronnie Carteret was the subject of a good deal of chaff that night at
mess. The Rajah was being entertained, and he was the only man who paid
the young officer any compliments on the matter of his achievement on
the racecourse. Everyone else openly declared that the horse, and not
its rider, was the one to be congratulated.
"Never saw anything so ludicrous in my life," one critic said. "He
looked like a rag doll in the saddle. How he managed to stick on passes
me. Is it the latest from America, Ronnie? Leaves something to be
desired, old chap! I should stick to the old style, if I were you."
Ronnie had no answer for the comments and advice showered upon him from
all sides. He received them all in silence, sullenly ignoring derisive
questions.
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