“And none too warm,” thought I, but neither cold nor discomfort could prevail for long against our utter exhaustion.
I sat up with a start. A grey day was breaking; the trees rustled in a wind that moaned and muttered with chilly breath. Big drops of rain beat on my face.
“Quick, Dan, get up!” I cried to the snoring partner of my dreams. “It’s going to pour down rain in a few minutes.”
We scurried around, collecting and packing our scattered belongings, then decided to make a dash for a big barn which stood not far down the road at the foot of a hill, for the rain was beginning to fall heavily. Reaching the highway, we sprang to saddle and sped down the hill. With a sickening lurch the front wheel struck a slippery patch of mud at the bottom, the hind wheel skidding sideways. The heel of my right shoe caught in the pedal shaft and in a trice was torn from my foot and sent spinning ten feet away. Dan went sprawling on the wet earth, while I hopped awkwardly along, bruising my shins, but clinging desperately to the handle bars with both hands.
Dan picked himself up and came to my assistance.
“Pick up my heel, please,” said I, standing like a stork on one foot. Dan stared at me dazedly. “Pick up my heel,” I cried impatiently. He reached for my foot. “Do you think I’m a horse waiting to be shod? Don’t you see the heel of my shoe lying over there in the mud?”
With that he retrieved the loosened heel and we hurried through the steady downpour to the barn. The owner came out and, having listened to our tale of woe, gave us some shingle nails to repair the torn shoe and bade us build a fire beneath a shed to prepare breakfast. Dan fulfilled the augury of the previous day by the purchase of some fresh eggs, and soon we were feasting on bacon and eggs and pints of steaming coffee.
Good? Why nectar and ambrosia were stale beside it.
After the meal, we repaired to the barn loft and, easing our weary bones into the prickly depths of hay, awaited the end of the storm.
FOUR