The team was of the sort that is always willing to stop, and the “equipage” was easily entered by merely stepping into its open rear. It swung low to the ground, after the fashion of Nova Scotian carts, and for seats it had a bundle of clean straw.
In another moment the animals had been goaded to fresh effort, their owner had turned about on the chain where he balanced himself for a seat and also turned a corner into a side street that climbed the hill behind the town. Then he ordered:
“Fire ahead! Tell everything you know; and I say, Sissy, did you ever see a purtier pair of creeturs than them be? I’m prouder of ’em than I could be of the finest team o’ thoroughbreds ever stepped. Gee, there! Haw, I tell ye!”
Beyond, at the postoffice, the truants had been suddenly missed; and with varying degrees of anxiety their elders were asking one another:
“What do you suppose has become of Dorothy and that queer boy?”
But Molly was more vexed than anxious and she looked upon Monty with rising disfavor. She guessed that they were having some fun from which she was shut out and which Montmorency Vavasour-Stark would never have had the originality to suggest.
“Oh! I wish I knew! Maybe they’re eating each other up! Yesterday she asked if he was a ‘wildcat’ and I told her ‘yes.’ Maybe, maybe—Oh! Why did you make us walk in front, namby-pamby so, Papa dear? If we’d been with them we’d know what they are doing and what has happened. Oh! dear! If I hadn’t been in front I’d have been behind!” she complained. Nor was she greatly pleased by the laugh which her Irish-cism raised.