“And you seem to be braver there than anywhere else,” thought Pemrose. “How did you ever get the courage to do it, catch Donnie by his little arms and drag him, almost, from under Cartoon’s heels,” looking silently, sidelong, at her friend, “you with all your little ‘whim-ma-garies’—foolish fears and fancies?” flicking at her horse’s neck, with a smile.
They broke into a canter, leaving the rest of the riding party behind.
“Wha-at a summer we’re having!” gasped Una next, as they reined in, to round a turn. “It—it’s the first time I’ve been with a lot of girls. And—the mountains!” She waved her riding crop.
“There—there are no words,” murmured Pemrose breathlessly. “All—all the old ones have patches on them!” She winked at her own bankruptcy, gazing up at a softly swelling mountainside, radiant in July green and silver, the silver of innumerable flashing birch trees, with a few maples thrown in—above them the dark emerald of spruce and pine.
“Look at the hardhack,” Una panted. “Isn’t it lovely? The roadside just pink—magenta! And, oh! there’s arrow head, white arrow head, wading into the water, down there.
“It’s as fond of the mud as you are—when you have the magic ring on.” It was a dark eye which winked slyly now, as Una pointed down a tangled slope that bordered, on one side, the narrow road, or bridle path, at a shallow pond, just snow-flecked with the broad-leaved arrow head. “And, oh-h! such violet asters! And, look there! purple deer grass—its heart of gold. Love-ly!”
There was a little break, a little catch in the voice of the girl whose brain was a wildflower basket.
“It—it makes everything so different, out-of-doors, when you can really identify the flowers and trees; not be, as the Guardian, says, a Mrs. Malaprop among them, going round all the time, miscalling them—or with a ‘]what-d’ye-call-’em’ on your lips.” Una laughed now—and there was a new, a wild-bird frolic in the laughter of this girl who went through life as daintily—as lovingly as if she were “picking a flower.”
“Wake up, Revel!” she said. “You’d never be a Mrs. Malaprop anywhere, would you? You’d always be a good Camp Fire Girl—you’re so knowing.”
And Revel shook her fair head and, snorting—blowing a cloud of silky breath over the compliment, as the girls, in their pretty linen riding habits, cantered onward again.