Of course Nan did not delay, and she went into raptures over the beautiful wheel, praising it generously as she examined every point with the eye of a connoisseur.
"But it seems to me a pretty high frame!" she speculated, standing off and taking it in from a distance.
"I wanted a high frame," responded Miss Blake.
"Seems to me pretty well up in the air for you, even with the saddle down," insisted Nan, doubtfully.
"You try it," suggested the governess. "If it suits you it will certainly be too high for me."
"It does suit me," announced Nan, balancing herself by a hand against the wall. "You'd better send it back and get a lower frame."
But Miss Blake shook her head.
"No, I like this and I'm going to keep it. But of course if it is too high I can't use it, and so—so—I'm afraid you'll have to, Nan. You won't mind, will you? I mean getting your birthday present this way ahead of time? I thought if we waited you'd lose the whole summer."
Nan flung herself from the wheel in a rapture of surprise. It seemed too good to be true. She could not believe it. Miss Blake had her thanks more in the girl's radiant delight than in the mere words she spoke, though these were genuine enough and full enough of gratitude.
All through the long season after that, whenever the heat was not too intense, Nan and her wheel could have been seen flashing through the Park or taking a well-earned rest in the cool shadow of the Dairy porch, where a sip of water seemed sweeter than ambrosia and a fugitive breeze more aromatic than any zephyr from Araby the blest.