"Shall we play something else?" I suggested. "I'm afraid if we play horses you will get untidy."
"Oh no, I won't!" he said confidently. "We'll be quiet horses.
"I know," he added, with a look of intelligence. "I won't be a horse; I'll be the driver, and you shall be a lame horse. Then the game will be such a quiet game."
"Very well," I replied, weakly yielding to his wishes, as most people had a habit of doing. And a minute later I was running round the library in a fashion most undignified for a lady of middle-age, becoming at the same time hotter and more breathless than was altogether comfortable. Consequently I slackened my pace, and found it more to my mind. For, when a good many years have passed since you indulged in the habit of playing horses, you find it more expedient to take for your model the slow and conscientious cab-horse rather than the swift and brilliant racer.
But the change did not please Chris.
"Gee-up, Charlie!" he cried, excitedly. "That's your name, you know. Gee-up! why are you going so slowly?"
"I've no breath left to go fast," I explained.
"What shall we do?" he said, perplexed. "I don't like a horse what won't go fast.
"Oh," he said, his face clearing. "Why, it's time for you to go lame. Poor Charlie! poor thing! what's the matter?
"You've got a stone in your foot," he explained in an aside, "and you must jog up and down as if you're lame."