"But I am going," cried Kate. "I will go—I must go. I positively cannot let Mary Taylor—my own beloved Molly—go and perpetrate matrimony without my being on hand to see it. Yes, I'm going—and if Phil has a spark of the old Blair pioneer spirit in her, she'll go too."
"Of course I'll go if you go," I said.
Aunt Jennie did not think we were in earnest, so she merely laughed at first, and said, "How do you propose to go? Fly—or swim?"
"We'll drive, as usual," said Kate calmly. "I'd feel more at home in that way of locomotion. We'll borrow Jim Nash's father's democrat, and take the ponies. We'll put on old clothes, raincoats, rubber caps and boots, and we'll start tomorrow. In an ordinary time we could easily do it in six days or less, but this fall we'll probably need ten or twelve."
"You don't really mean to go, Kate!" said Aunt Jennie, beginning to perceive that Kate did mean it.
"I do," said Kate, in a convincing tone.
Aunt Jennie felt a little worried—as much as she could feel worried over anything—and she tried her best to dissuade Kate, although she plainly did not have much hope of doing so, having had enough experience with her determined daughter to realize that when Kate said she was going to do a thing she did it. It was rather funny to listen to the ensuing dialogue.
"Kate, you can't do it. It's a crazy idea! The road is one hundred and twenty miles long."
"I've driven it twice, Mother."
"Yes, but not in such a wet year. The trail is impassable in places."