“Don’t make fun!” groaned Agnes. “Suppose it should jump into the car?”
“If we only had a gun,” began Neale.
“Well, I hope you haven’t, young man,” cried Mrs. Heard. “I’m deadly afraid of firearms.”
“Don’t get out of the car, Neale,” begged Agnes, clasping her hands.
“Try to back away from it,” suggested Ruth.
The smaller girls clung to each other (Dot determinedly to the Alice-doll, as well), and, although they did not say much, they were frightened. Tess whispered:
“Oh, dear me! I’m ‘fraid enough of the wriggling fish-worms that Sammy digs in our garden. And this snake is a hundred times as big!”
“And fish-worms don’t shoot people with their tongues, do they?” suggested Dot.
Just at that very moment, when the six-foot rattler had coiled to strike again, there was a rattling and jangling of tinware from up the road. There was a turn not far ahead, and the young folks could not see beyond it.
“Goodness me!” exploded Agnes, “what’s coming now?”