Polly threw up her head and laughed, a genuine, exhilarating little laugh, which brought Benedicta’s hands down from her face, showing her eyes big and red and staring.
“I hadn’t the least idea, Benedicta, that you smashed my car on purpose.” She laughed again.
“Teeters and tongs!” ejaculated the housekeeper, “if you ain’t the limit!”
“I am afraid my patience will be at the ‘limit’ if Lilith and Dolly don’t come pretty quick.”
“Oh, I don’t want ’em to, till I’ve told you how it happened!”
“Hurry up, then!”
“I will, I will!” And Benedicta dropped into the doorway at Polly’s feet. “I didn’t smash it, Miss Polly, as you said—that is, I only smashed up a headlight and one wheel. You see, I went down the hill careful, just as you told me to, and was goin’ along Fountain Street pretty good, when who should I spy comin’ towards me, in an auto, but my Miss Flora and Mr. Aimé! I couldn’t believe my eyes at first, and I said to myself, ‘It ain’t them!’—‘It is, too!’—‘It ain’t!’—‘It is!’—just like that. Then, when I see they were real flesh and blood, if I didn’t steer for ’em—not thinkin’, I s’pose, but that I was drivin’ a horse an’ buggy—and before they could get out o’ my way bang—! I was right into ’em! The queer part is, I didn’t hurt them a mite, or their car, either. But what did make me do such a fool thing—that’s what I’d like to know!”
“You are not the first one, Benedicta, that has run into another car.”
“Don’ know ’s I want to be a fool ’cause somebody else is! Wal, Mr. Aimé towed my—your car to the garage that Dick Ringo keeps—I’ve known Dick ever since he was an infant, and he let me have this car. He said it was a dandy, and you’d never know the difference. But I told him, ‘Don’t you b’lieve that nonsense, Dick Ringo!’—‘Know the difference!’ I saw what would happen soon ’s you set your eyes on it, an’ I was scared out o’ my senses. Dick said they’d fix up yours good as new; so I kep’ comfortin’ myself all the way home by sayin’ it might ha’ been worse. But I couldn’t bear to have you know it—no, I couldn’t. An’, Miss Polly, what do you think! My Miss Flora and Mr. Aimé want me to come live with them, same as I did before. But I said, ‘No, sir! I’m goin’ to stay with Miss Polly to the last minute she’s here, an’ if she comes up to Overlook Mountain next year and the next and the next, I’m with her through the very last next.’—My, there’s Miss Brooks luggin’ that child!” And Benedicta ran across the lawn to take Dolly from the arms of Lilith.
The miles to the railway station were covered in good time, and the borrowed car was waiting for Sardis Merrifield when the first whistle of the 11.45 train rang down the narrow valley of Overlook.