"Confess you wanted to sit by me!" he whispered.
"But I didn't!" she protested hotly. "I never was in a automobile before and I just wanted to see how it worked!"
She almost persuaded herself that this was true when they reached the long stretch of parkway, and Mac let her take the wheel. It was only when in the course of instruction Mac's hand lingered too long on hers, or his gay, careless face leaned too close, that she had her misgivings.
"Say! this is great!" she cried rapturously, with her feet braced and her eyes on the long road ahead. "When it don't get the hic-cups, it beats a horse all hollow!"
"What do you know about horses?" teased Mac, giving unnecessary assistance with the wheel.
"Enough to keep my hands off the reins when another fellow's driving!" she said coolly—a remark that moved Mac to boisterous laughter.
When they were on the homeward way and Mac had taken the wheel again, they found little to say to each other. Once he got her to light a cigarette for him, and once or twice she asked a question about the engine. In Calvary Alley one talked or one didn't as the mood suggested, and Nance was unversed in the fine art of making conversation. It disturbed her not a whit that she and the handsome youth beside her had no common topic of interest. It was quite enough for her to sit there beside him, keenly aware that his arm was pressing hers and that every time she glanced up she found him glancing down.
It was a night of snow and moonshine, one of those transitorial nights when winter is going and spring is coming. Nance held her breath as the car plunged headlong into one mass of black shadows after another only to emerge triumphant into the white moonlight. She loved the unexpected revelations of the headlights, which turned the dim road to silver and lit up the dark turf at the wayside. She loved the crystal-clear moon that was sailing off and away across those dim fields of virgin snow. And then she was not thinking any longer, but feeling—feeling beauty and wonder and happiness and always the blissful thrill of that arm pressed against her own.
Not until they were nearing the city did she remember the couple on the back seat.
"Wake up there!" shouted Mac, tossing his cap over his shoulder. "Gone to sleep?"