I felt my face grow redder than ever, but what I had said was no mere boast.
"But I was frightened," added he; and then, in a very gentle voice, "You won't do it again, will you?"
His temper had done me good, his tenderness was almost too much for me.
"No," murmured I; and the sense that he cared made my voice tremble so that I dared say no more.
"A girl doesn't know how soon she has played one prank too many. I can tell you that we ran a greater danger just now than we did when the bull was near tossing you. Do you remember it?"
Did I remember it? Ay, and many other things since then. The thought of them kept me silent, and kept my heart beating till I was afraid he would see it. Ah me, what would I have given to be back again under that five-barred gate, with Trayton Harrod standing over me, and all the future before me! But now—what was the future?
"Will you promise me not to be so foolish again?" repeated he, gently. "There's no fun in breaking one's neck, you know."
My heart was big; he was very kind to me, very careful of me—just as he had been always. I waited—waited for him to say something more, for him to lay his hand once again upon mine, though it were to check Marigold's bridle.
But the mare was going quite quietly now, and there was no need for him to lay his hand on her bridle. He did not seem even to notice that I had not answered his question. We were riding up alongside the hop-fields where the camp was set. Along the lanes groups of village hop-pickers were coming home; whole families, who sallied forth every morning with dinners in bag and basket, and babies in blue-shaded perambulators. The conical straw huts made a circle under the maple hedge, and in the middle of the field the folk were filling their pitchers and kettles at two large water-butts on wheels drawn up there for their use. We tied our horses to the fence, and walked up. The women were beginning to light their fires, and father was expostulating with a tall, handsome girl who had begun to lay hers too near the dangerous straw.