“Yes. Look at the way he is holding those reins—nice and straight and firm. The horses know he’s there, all right. They trust him. They know him. Look at him now! It’s just as if he were saying to them: ‘Take it easy, old fellows, we’re all here together.’”
Baron leaned forward and watched the disappearing dray. Yes, there was a certain method in the man’s way of holding the reins, and in his whole bearing, which suggested just what the child had put into words.
He leaned back and clasped his hands behind his head and smiled.
“What is it?” asked Bonnie May anxiously.
“I’m afraid I couldn’t explain to you. I was just thinking about—about certain forms of reconstruction.”
CHAPTER XVI
MRS. THORNBURG REVEALS A SECRET
Baron shook his head slowly. He had been thinking about that advertisement in the Times which Thornburg had answered without any result.
“Strange,” he mused. “I won’t believe but that somebody is looking for her—somewhere. Children like that are not dropped down and deserted like superfluous kittens or puppies. There’s something wrong somewhere.”
Then he remembered that Mrs. Thornburg wished to see him; that, according to Thornburg, she had “mentioned Bonnie May.”
Possibly she knew something. At any rate, Baron felt that he ought to call on her. It was just after the dinner-hour—of the day on which Mrs. Baron had announced her policy of reconstruction—and the evening was flinging a challenge to all mankind to get out of doors and enjoy the spring air.