Prue ran lightly down the flagged walk with her prize. "I shall begin at the gate," she announced, "so if we don't quite finish it to-day people who go by can see we are beginning to get our grass cut."
Oswyth laughed and groaned. "Finish it to-day! Cut the whole place!" she exclaimed.
Oswyth, with her sweet, placid face, smooth, shining brown hair, calm blue eyes and quiet lips, was unlike either of the others. Pretty she was in her demure way, and no one minded if her soft cheeks were a bit too plump, since their tint was really the "peaches and cream" of which we read. Wythie was a most womanly and wholesome little woman, the sort of girl one sees at first glance must comfort the mother who possesses her.
Prue, undismayed by Wythie's dismay, turned the lawn-mower sharply to the right for her first bold plunge into the grass—and stopped. The dry, stout stalks resisted her onslaught, and the little girl pushed, pulled back, pushed again, bending over the handle till her flying, golden hair fell forward into the yellowing grass, but the machine would not stir. Prue dropped the handle, straightened her slender form, and, with one movement of both hands, disclosing a face already flushed and speckled by her efforts, threw back her hair and threw up the game.
"I can't budge it, Rob!" she panted. "No one could."
"Want to try, Wythie, or shall I?" asked Rob.
"Want to? I don't quite see why anyone should want to," said Oswyth, "but I suppose we each must, so here goes." And she heroically came forward to take her turn, laying her dimpled and well-cushioned little pink palms on the cross-bar of the handle somewhat gingerly.
She cut a glorious though short swath of four feet in length, happening on more tender grass, and having more strength than Prue, but here she, too, met her Waterloo, for the mower stood still, balking as effectually as all the donkeys in Ireland.
"There's no use in your taking it, Rob," Wythie gasped, after turning hither and thither with no result. "If you cut a few feet it would be the most that you could do, and what difference would it make out of so much?"
"You don't suppose I'll yield without striking a blow?" cried Roberta, darting at the lawn-mower as if she were no further removed from Samson than his great-granddaughter at most. "I have meant to cut this grass for ages—it shows that," she added, laughing. "Besides, it always matters a lot to me to be beaten. 'Men o' Harlech, in the hollow!'"