Diamond's mother said he might go as far as that. Dancing with delight, Diamond ran to get his cap and in a few minutes was jumping into the cab. The man gave him the reins and showed him how to drive safely through the gate and Diamond got along famously. Just as they were turning into the square, they had an adventure. It was getting quite dusky. A cab was coming rapidly from the other direction, and Diamond pulling aside and the other driver pulling up, they just escaped a collision. And there was his father!
"Why, Diamond, it is a bad beginning to run into your own father," he said.
"But, father, wouldn't it have been a bad ending for you to run into your own son!" answered the boy. And both men laughed heartily.
"He is a good little driver, though," said the man. "He would be fit to drive on his own hook in a week or two. But he had better go back with you now."
"Come along then, Diamond," said his father. Diamond jumped across into the other cab and they drove away home.
It was not long before Diamond was a great favorite with all the men about the stables—he was so jolly! It was not the best place in the world for him to be brought up in and at first he did hear a good many rough and bad words. But as he did not like them, he never learned to say them and they did him little harm. Before long, the men grew rather ashamed to use them. One would nudge the other to remind him that the boy was within hearing and the words choked themselves before they got any further.
One day, they gave him a curry comb and brush to try his hand on old Diamond's coat. He used them deftly and thoroughly as far as he could reach.
"You must make haste and grow," the men told him. "It won't do to clean a horse half way up and leave his back dirty, you know."
"Put me up," said Diamond. In a moment he was on the old horse's back with the comb and brush. There he combed and brushed and combed and brushed. Every now and then, old Diamond would whisk his tail and once he sent the comb flying out of the stable door to the great amusement of the men. But they brought it back to him and Diamond finished his task.
"Oh, dear!" said Diamond, when he had done. "I'm so tired!" And he laid himself down at full length on old Diamond's back. The men were much amused and from that time were always ready to teach him to drive.