Then when the basket had been handed up to John, the pair merrily saluted the women on the porch and rode away; but Mrs. Benton called shrilly after them:
“Turn back and start over again! Turn back, I say! Both your horses set off left feet first. That means bad luck as sure as you are born!”
But nobody paid any heed to Aunt Sally’s forecasts of evil, save to laugh at them. Only Mrs. Trent again felt that nervous shiver seize her, and but for shame’s sake would have begged her daughter to defer her ride until another day.
However, shame prevailed; or common sense, which is far better; and well it was––or ill––that the riders kept serenely on their way, indifferent to “signs” and ignorant of what lay before them.
CHAPTER X.
ON THE ROAD HOME
The train from Los Angeles rolled slowly up to the little station at Marion and the asthmatic engine seemed to wheeze its relief that its labor was ended, as an old man stepped from the last car and looked eagerly along the platform. Then a certain degree of disappointment overspread his fine face, and shouldering a heavy parcel, strapped round with leather to give a holding place, he strode rather unsteadily forward over the same sandy road, or street, which had tried Ninian Sharp’s patience on his first visit to the post town.
Yet, after a little, the man grew accustomed to his own stiffness of limb and moved with a sort of halting swiftness which soon brought him to the little hostelry of one Aleck McLeod, where a group of ranchmen were sunning themselves while they waited the distribution of the mail.