“Oh, I hope and trust that the storm will not burst till we reach shelter!” cried Emmie, whose dread of thunder and lightning is already known to the reader.
“We are running a race with it, and we’ll be at the winning-post first!” exclaimed Vibert, who was enjoying the excitement, and who was rather amused than vexed to see his sister’s alarm.
“But, Vibert, you don’t even know the way to Myst Court! Oh, I wish that you had waited for Bruce!”
It had never occurred to the thoughtless lad that he might be driving in a wrong direction; so long as the pony went as fast as Vibert wished, he had taken it for granted that Myst Court would soon be reached. The station had been left far behind; the road was lonesome and wild; only one solitary boy was in sight; he was engaged in picking up boughs and twigs which a recent gale had blown down from the trees which bordered the way.
“We’ll ask yonder bare-footed bundle of rags to direct us,” said Vibert, and he drew up the panting pony when he reached the spot where the boy was standing.
“I say, young one, which is the way to Myst Court?” asked Vibert in a tone of command.
The boy stared at him, as if unaccustomed to the sight of strangers.
“Are we on the right road to the large house where Mrs. Myers used to live?” inquired Emmie.
“Ay, ay, but you’ll have to turn down yon lane just by the stile there,” said the urchin, pointing with his brown finger, and grinning as if a chaise with a lady in it were a rare and curious sight.
“I don’t believe that the rustic could have told us whether to turn to left or right,” said Vibert, as he whipped on the pony. “If he’s a fair specimen of my father’s tenants, we shall feel as if we had dropped down on the Fiji Islands.”