“Hallo! he is going rather lame,” said Max. “Surely he can’t have had a stone in his shoe all this time? We’ll stop and find out.... Why! this is worse than a stone—he has lost a shoe!”
There was nothing to be done now, except to let the pony go at his own pace, and keep him to the side of the road where the snow lay thinnest. At a very leisurely rate the party journeyed up the remainder of the hill, Rough stumbling badly every now and then.
“Here we are, at last!” sighed Max, as the road again became level, and the increased severity of the storm, reaching them across the high, open country, told the travellers that they were on the edge of Rowdon Common. “We have a rough stone wall on one side of us now, and a pretty wide ditch on the other; so we must jog along carefully.”
Max and Frances both decided to go on walking; and Florry, after whispering persuasions to Austin, joined them, in order to relieve Rough a little more.
Poor Austin’s temper suffered from his indignation at this attempt on the girls’ part to “coddle” him. The liveliest recollections of his latest bad throat never sufficed to keep him out of danger if he possibly could get into it. Max and his companions just then halted for a moment under lee of the wall, intending to give Rough a breathing-time; and Austin, in a fit of impatience, seized the reins as they hung loose, and tugged them heedlessly.
The culprit’s ill-temper vanished as he and the trap and the pony swerved all together and turned clean over into the ditch, now half-covered by a deep drift. Frances and the others, in the better light of the open ground, saw the rapid movement of the little carriage, and for an instant held their breath; then peals of laughter from Austin assured them that he was safe, and the three rushed to the rescue.
Austin pulled himself out of the snow, and wriggled from Frances’s grasp.
“I’m all right, Sis; don’t worry! Damp? Oh, well, not particularly. I’m going to help Max to get Rough on his legs. This is rough on Rough, isn’t it? Ho, ho!”
But Frances, who knew that her brother was something more than “damp”, could hardly speak. Her sufferings were far greater than the patient’s when Austin had quinsy; and she blamed herself bitterly for not insisting on the obviously prudent course she had suggested in Exham. A strong carriage and sturdy horse would long ago have conveyed the quartette safely to Woodend; and now here they were, up on the Common, exposed to the force of the storm, and with no prospect of speedy escape. Austin would be certain to take cold if his damp clothes were not soon dried. The poor pony, after his fall and fright, would surely be quite disabled.
Indeed, Rough, when again on his feet, stood shivering and snorting, and positively refused to move further.