Though the man were to die why shouldn’t the people dance?  Had the Major been dying three or four miles off, at the hotel at Rufford, there would only have been a few sad looks, a few shakings of the head, and the people would have danced without any flaw in their gaiety.  Had it been known at Rufford Hall that he was lying at that moment in his mortal agony at Aberdeen, an exclamation or two,—­ “Poor Caneback!”—­“Poor Major!”—­would have been the extent of the wailing, and not the pressure of a lover’s hand would have been lightened, or the note of a fiddle delayed.  And nobody in that house really cared much for Caneback.  He was not a man worthy of much care.  He was possessed of infinite pluck, and now that he was dying could bear it well.  But he had loved no one particularly, had been dear to no one in these latter days of his life, had been of very little use in the world, and had done very little more for society than any other horse-trainer!  But nevertheless it is a bore when a gentleman dies in your house,—­and a worse bore if he dies from an accident than if from an illness for which his own body may be supposed to be responsible.  Though the gout should fly to a man’s stomach in your best bedroom, the idea never strikes you that your burgundy has done it!  But here the mare had done the mischief.

Poor Caneback;—­and poor Lord Rufford!  The Major was quite certain that it was all over with himself.  He had broken so many of his bones and had his head so often cracked that he understood his own anatomy pretty well.  There he lay quiet and composed, sipping small modicums of brandy and water, and taking his outlook into such transtygian world as he had fashioned for himself in his dull imagination.  If he had misgivings he showed them to no bystander.  If he thought then that he might have done better with his energies than devote them to dangerous horses, he never said so.  His voice was weak, but it never quailed; and the only regret he expressed was that he had not changed the bit in Jemima’s mouth.  Lord Rufford’s position was made worse by an expression from Sir John Purefoy that the party ought to be put off.  Sir John was in a measure responsible for what his mare had done, and was in a wretched state.  “If it could possibly affect the poor fellow I would do it,” said Lord Rufford; “but it would create very great inconvenience and disappointment.  I have to think of other people.”  “Then I shall send my wife home,” said Sir John.  And Lady Purefoy was sent home.  Sir John himself of course could not leave the house while the man was alive.  Before they all sat down to dinner the Major was declared to be a little stronger.  That settled the question and the ball was not put off.

The ladies came down to dinner in a melancholy guise.  They were not fully dressed for the evening and were of course inclined to be silent and sad.  Before Lord Rufford came in Arabella managed to get herself on to the sofa next to Lady Penwether, and then to undergo some little hysterical manifestation, “Oh Lady Penwether; if you had seen it;—­and heard it!”