“I’m sorry to trouble you,” he said, speaking in a general downward direction.
“You’re not troubling me,” came back the answer.
The driver had reached his dray, and greatly to Baron’s amazement, he put a foot on the hub of the wheel, a disengaged hand on the iron bar surrounding the back of the seat, and had vaulted into a sitting posture, carrying his burden with him.
It seemed to Baron that he had been swung through limitless space, as if he had been a star, held to its place by gravity. He held his hat in place, as he might have done if a cyclone had seized him in its clutch. And with such attention as he could command he was observing the performance of the driver.
“Sit down,” commanded that individual: needlessly, for already Baron was by his side, holding on to the iron bar at the back of the seat, and feeling uncomfortably light and dizzy. His companion looked into his eyes. “A pretty hard jolt,” he said, thrusting a protecting arm about his charge. “Gee-app!” He pulled the reins dexterously with the aid of thumb and little finger, and the horses began to move.
Much to Baron’s surprise, the driver did not ask him where he lived, but quietly turned his horses’ heads in the right direction, adjusting the brake with his foot, and glancing ahead to see that the right of way was clear.
Baron’s mind reverted to Bonnie May for an instant, and he remembered that she had noted how the driver had held his reins with authority, and sat with his great legs planted purposefully before him. Yes, that was precisely right.
“You haven’t asked me where I live,” he remarked, trying to be partly independent of his companion’s support.
“I don’t have to. I know.”
“How?”