“I tried to,” said the lad quietly, “but I couldn’t hold him long.”
“Long enough to save her, my lad,” cried the old man, looking from one to the other in a peculiar way.—“How strange—how strange!” he muttered.
Then aloud, in an abrupt way:
“There, never mind the pony. You be off home, sir. I’ll take care of this lady.”
Ralph coloured a little, and glanced at the girl, and as she met his eyes, she drew herself up stiffly.
“Yes, sir,” she said, “Master Rayburn will take care of me. Thank you for stopping my pony.”
She bowed now, in the stately way of the period, clung closely to the old man, turning her back upon her rescuer, who unnecessarily bowed, and walked on up the steep path, wondering that the pony had not come down headlong before.
Then he felt disposed to look back, but his angry indignation forbade that, and he hurried on as fast as he could on his way home, passing Master Rayburn’s cottage, and then, a hundred yards farther on, coming suddenly upon a riding-whip, which had evidently been dropped. The lad leaped at it to pick it up, but checked himself, and gave it a kick which sent it off the path down the slope toward the river.
“I’m not going to pick up an Eden’s whip,” he said proudly. “Just like her brother,” he muttered, as he went on faster and faster, to avoid the temptation of running back to pick it up. “They are a proud, evil race,” as father said. “What did I want to interfere for, and stop the pony? It was looked upon as an insult, I suppose. I don’t like the Edens, and I never shall.”
Ralph’s adventures for that day were not ended. A quarter of a mile farther on he heard footsteps in front. Some one was running, and at a turn of the track a lad came into sight, whom he recognised as Dummy Rugg, one of the mine lads. The pair came closer quickly, and Ralph saw that he was recognised, and that the boy was scowling at him, passing him with rather an evil look, but stopping the next minute, and running back after him. As soon as he heard the steps returning, Ralph faced round, his left hand seeking the sheath of his sword, to bring it round in case he should want to draw. But the next minute he saw that the lad had no evil intent.