"Fran," he pleaded, "don't drive out of Sure-Enough Country. Wait long enough for me to tell you what you are to me."
"I know what I am to you," Fran retorted—"Git ap!"
"But what am I to you? Don't drive so fast—the trees are racing past like mad. I won't leave Sure-Enough Country until I've told you all—"
"You shall! No, I'll not let you take this whip—"
"I will take it—let go—Fran! Blessed darling Fran—"
She gripped the whip tightly. He could not loosen her hold, but he could keep her hand in his, which was just as well. Still, a semblance of struggling was called for, and that is why the sound of approaching wheels was drowned in laughter.
"Here we are!" Fran cried wickedly—"Make-Believe World of Every-Day, and some of its inhabitants…"
A surrey had come down the seldom-used road—had Miss Sapphira followed Abbott in order to discover him with Fran? The suspicion was not just, but his conscience seemed to turn color—or was it his face? In fact, Fran and Abbott were both rather red—caused, possibly, by their struggle over the whip.
On the front seat of the surrey were Miss Sapphira and Bob Clinton. On the back seat was Simon Jefferson whose hairy hand gripped a halter fastened to a riderless horse: the very horse which should have been between the shafts of the Gregory buggy.
Miss Sapphira stared at Abbott, speechless. So this is what he had meant by wanting the air unstrained by window-screens. Studying, indeed! Abbott, in his turn, stared speechlessly at the led horse.