"I am sure if I can, you can," grandma assured her. "What shall it be about, children?"
"Oh, about when you were a little girl," cried Edna.
"About the time the horse ran away with you," spoke up the boys.
"About your first ball please," begged Celia.
Grandma laughed. "Just listen to them. They have heard all those things dozens of times. I'll tell you what we will do. I will tell about the runaway horse, that belongs to the time when I was a little girl, and Emmeline shall tell about her first ball, and I can remind her if she forgets anything. I remember her first ball even better than my first, for it was at hers I met your grandfather."
This was all so satisfactory that there was not a murmur of dissent, and grandma began: "It was when I was about ten years old that I went one day with my father to the nearest village. He was driving a pair of spirited horses, and on our way home a parcel we were bringing home, fell out of the buggy. My father stopped the horses and ran back to pick up the parcel, but before he could get to the buggy, the horses took fright at a piece of paper blowing along the road in front of them and off they started, full tilt, down the road. In vain my father cried, 'Hey, there! Whoa, Barney! Whoa Pet!' on they went faster and faster. I managed to hold on to the reins but my young hands were not strong enough to control the wild creatures, and I thought every minute would be my last, for up hill and down dale we went at such a pace I had never known. Over a stump would jounce the buggy, and I would nearly pitch out. Around the last curve they went with a swing which I thought would land me on my back or my head, but I managed to keep my seat and at last saw the open gate of our own lane before me. Would the horses go through without hitting a gate post? Would they run into a fence or over a pile of stones at one side? My heart was in my mouth. I jerked the reins in a vain attempt to guide them, but on they went, pell-mell, making straight for the open gate. Presently I saw some one rush from the house and then another person come flying from the stables. Just before we reached the gate, it was flung to with a bang. The horses pranced, swung a little to one side and stopped short, and I heard some one say, 'So, Barney, so Pet!' I didn't know what happened next but the first thing I knew I was lying on the lounge in the sitting-room, my mother bending over me, and holding a bottle of salts to my nose, 'Oh, dear, oh, dear,' my mother was crying, 'another minute and the child might have been killed.'"
"Who was it shut the gate?" asked Allen eagerly.
"Amanda's mother, who was living with us at that time."
"And who caught the horses?" queried Ted.
"Jim Doughty, who was our hired man."