John bridled and Robin looked disappointed. Expectations of the toboggan-slide’s being made ready had filled his head, and he and the old man had toiled for hours to make the sled at which the Bishop looked so doubtfully.
“Well, your Reverence—I mean—you without the Reverence—” here the Bishop smiled and Robin giggled, thereby causing his host to turn about with a frown. “You see, sir, Robin’s always been hearin’ about your toboggan up here to Oak Knowe and’s been just plumb crazy—”
At this point the shy lad pulled John’s coat, silently begging him to leave him out of the talk; but the farmer had been annoyed by Robin’s ill-timed giggle, and testily inquired:
“Well, sir, ain’t that so? Didn’t you pester the life clean out o’ me till I said I’d try? Hey?”
“Y-yes,” meekly assented the boy; then catching a glimpse of Dorothy and Winifred and their beckoning nods he slipped away to them. To him Dorothy proudly exhibited her beautiful toboggan, explaining its fine construction with a glibness that fitted an “old tobogganer” better than this beginner at the sport. Gwen’s face beamed again, listening to her, as if she felt a more personal pride in the sled than even Dorothy herself. She even unbent so far from her pride of rank as to suggest:
“If you’ll let me borrow it and he’d like to go, I’ll take Robin down once, to show him how smoothly it runs.”
Robin’s eyes sparkled. He wasn’t shy with girls, but only when he felt himself made too conspicuous by his host’s talk.
“Would you? Could she? May she?” he cried, teetering about on his ragged shoes in an ecstasy of delight.
Dolly laughed and clapped her hands.