Mr. Lancaster accepts a Mission.
When Dick Lancaster saw Olive he stopped with a start, and then ran toward her.
"Miss Asher!" he exclaimed. "What are you doing here? What is the matter? You look pale."
When she saw him coming Olive had dismounted, not with the active spring usual with her, but heavily and clumsily. She did not even smile as she spoke to him.
"I am glad to see you, Mr. Lancaster," she said. "I am on my way back to Broadstone, and I would like to send a message to my uncle by you."
"Back from where? And why on this road?" he was about to ask, but he checked himself. He saw that she trembled as she stood.
"Miss Asher," said he, "you must stop and rest. Let me take your wheel and come over to this bank and sit down."
She sat down in the shade and took off her hat; and for a moment she quietly enjoyed the cool breeze upon her head. He did not want to annoy her with questions, but he could not help saying:
"You look very tired."
"I ought to be tired," she answered, "for I have gone over a perfectly dreadful road. Of course, you wonder why I came this way, and the best thing for me to do is to begin at the beginning and to tell you all about it, so that you will know what I have been doing, and then understand what I would like you to do for me."