Peter was no stammerer, and it irritated him very much to be saying all this so awkwardly, but there was something about the cool dark eyes of this girl, as she stood looking at him, which rather disconcerted him. She had evidently just dismounted from her horse, and now Peter observed two things--first that she was rather oddly pale, and second, that her side-saddle had slipped, and rested at an altogether improper angle upon the horse's back. As he saw this he came forward.
"What is the matter?" he asked quickly. "You haven't had a fall? You didn't ride this way, of course?"
"Yes, I did," she answered, lifting her head rather high, and then suddenly drooping it again.
"How far? When did it slip? Were you alone?" Peter examined the side-saddle.
"It began to slip--back--at--the boulevard," said the girl, rather slowly. "I--I don't know just how I kept on, but I did. Lewis is n't here. He ought to be. I can't put up Blackthorn myself."
"Let me do it for you." Peter took the bridle from her. He soon had the horse in the stall and had put away the saddle and bridle.
"That was a plucky thing to do," declared Peter, coming back to the stable door, where the girl had dropped into the coachman's chair, "to ride home with a slipping saddle. But you ought not to have done it, you know. It might have slipped a lot more with a jerk, and thrown you. See here, you 're not feeling just right, are you? Shall I call somebody?"
"No, no!" She started up. "If mother knew the least thing went wrong she would n't let me ride at all. If you--if you just would n't mind staying here a little, till I feel like myself again----"
"Why, of course I will"--and Peter stayed.
It was only for a few minutes, and meanwhile Lewis, the coachman, had returned, and the matter of the loose saddle-girth had been fully discussed by all three. Then Peter took his way home.