So Jenny got into the sleigh, with the reins in her hands, and she found that she could turn him around without any difficulty. She had never driven alone before, but she had often driven when her father was seated in the sleigh with her, so that she knew very well how to guide the horse to the right or left by pulling one rein, and how to make him stop by pulling both; so that she had no difficulty in turning him round, and then stopping him before he went out into the road. Here she paused to consider.
“If I don’t go back,” said she to herself, “my father will come out to find me, and be afraid I am killed. Perhaps he is walking along home after me now. If I go in the house here, there is nobody to drive the horse back, and it is too far for my father to walk. Yes, I will drive him back; and then, besides, there is the bag upon the step. I can carry my father his bag, and so get the bran for my chickens.”
The sleigh was standing very near the step, at this time, but Jenny drove a little nearer, so that she could step out and get the bag. She kept hold of the reins all the time, with one hand.
She put the bag into the bottom of the sleigh, and then got in again herself. She then carefully drove the horse down out of the yard into the road, and turned him in the direction towards the village. When she came to the place for going down the bank to the river, her courage failed a little. She was afraid to drive into the water. However, she kept the reins still, and held on as firmly as she could, and the horse carried her safely through.
“Now, pony, you must go faster,” she said, when the horse was fairly upon the river. So she took the whip, which was lying in the bottom of the sleigh, and touched him very lightly with it. The horse trotted on at great speed. The road passed sometimes out in the middle of the stream, and sometimes it curved along by the shore, under a high bank overhung with trees. Sometimes she was in the moonlight, and sometimes in shadow; but the road was smooth and true, and she glided over it like a bird.
Presently she saw something dark at a distance before her. In a few minutes, she perceived that it was moving. It was a horse and sleigh coming on towards her.
“What shall I do now?” said Jenny.
The first thought was to stop the horse, and tell the man who was in the sleigh her story, and get him to go back with her. But then she reflected that she was getting along very well without any help, and that probably the people in the sleigh had a home of their own that they wanted to get to, as well as she.
“On the whole, if I can only get by them,” she said to herself, “I will go directly on.”
So she turned out well from the path, when she found that she was near them, and got by without any trouble. There were a man and a woman in the sleigh, and they looked up astonished at seeing so small a girl driving a sleigh at that time of night, and on such a solitary road. But then the two sleighs passed each other so quick, that the travellers had no time to say any thing to Jenny, and so she drove on.