She was silent till they reached the road. Then she asked abruptly, "Are you ever afraid?"
"Well, you see," said Andy, with a laugh, "I never know whether I'm afraid or only excited—in fighting, I mean. Otherwise I don't fancy I'm either often."
"Well, you're big," she observed. "I'm afraid of pretty nearly everything—horses, dogs, motor-cars—and I'm passionately afraid of hunting."
"You're not big, you see," said Andy consolingly. Indeed her hand on the reins looked almost ridiculously small.
"I've got to learn not to be afraid of things. My father's teaching me. You know who I am, don't you?"
"Oh yes; why, I remember you years ago! Is that why you're out hunting?"
"Yes."
"And why you think that the pony—?"
"Is lame enough to let me risk going home? Yes." There was a hint of defiance in her voice. "You must think what you like," she seemed to say.
Andy considered the matter in his impartial, solid, rather slowly moving mind. It was foolish to be frightened at such things; it must be wholesome to be taught not to be. Still, hunting wasn't exactly a moral duty, and the girl looked very fragile. He had not arrived at any final decision on the case—on the issue whether the girl were silly or the father cruel (the alternatives might not be true alternatives, not strictly exclusive of one another)—before she spoke again.