'It is frightfully cold; and I don't see how we are going, for both those caravans are brimful,' croaked Lavinia, chafing her purple nose, and wishing it had occurred to her to buy a muff before going to sunny Italy.
'I have got through tickets, and some one is bound to see us over these snow-banks, so "trust in Providence and the other man," and we shall come out right, I assure you,' replied the energetic Amanda, who had conferred with a spectral being in the darkness, and blindly put her faith in him.
Away lumbered one diligence after the other, the first drawn by seven horses, the second by five, while the carrier's little cart with one brought up the rear. But still three muffled ladies sat upon a cool stone in the dark square, waiting for the spectre to keep his promise.
He did like a man; for suddenly the doors of an old stable flew open, and out rattled a comfortable carriage with a pair of stout little horses jingling their bells, and a brisk driver, whose voice was pleasant, as he touched his hat and invited the ladies to enter, assuring them that they would soon overtake and pass the heavy diligences before them.
'Never again will I doubt you, my Amanda,' cried the Raven, packing herself into the dowager's corner with a grateful heart.
'I hope the top of this carriage opens, for I must see everything,' cried Matilda, prancing about on the front seat in a chaos of wraps, books, bottles, and lunch-baskets.
'Of course it does, and when there is anything to see we will see it. It is dark and cold now, so we'd better all go to sleep again.'
With which sage remark, Amanda burrowed into her cloaks and slumbered. But not the other two. Matilda stuck her head out of one window, uttering little cries of wonder and delight at all she saw; while Livy watched the solemn stars pale one by one as the sky brightened, and felt as if she were climbing up, out of a dark valley of weariness and pain, into a new world full of grand repose.
Slowly winding higher and higher through the damp pine forest, softly stirring in the morning wind, they saw the sky warm from its cold gray to a rosy glow, making ready for the sun to rise as they never saw it rise before.