CHAPTER XIX
THE ORDER OF RELEASE
"Don't you think it's time Garth was home?"
Aileen Macleod was standing by the garden gate, shading her eyes as she looked across the paddocks. Her husband, who had come upon her unexpectedly, laughed a little.
"Oh, hen with one chick!" he said, "will you ever learn to let that boy out of your sight for an hour?"
"Indeed, I think I'm very good," Aileen defended herself. "I let him go all over the country, which you know very well, and climb enormous trees, and go swimming with the O'Connor boys, and use an axe, and do all sorts of things that would have filled us both with horror six months ago. And I take hold of myself with both hands and say, 'Aileen Macleod, you're not going to be nervous and make a poodle of your son!' But this is the first day he has ridden Roany to the township, Tom: and, you know, Roany isn't old Jane!"
"No, thank goodness!" said Tom with fervour. "But you needn't worry, really, dear: he manages Roany quite well, and the pony is perfectly safe. And you are good, and so am I, because often I'm just as nervous about the blessed kid as you are—so there!" They smiled at each other. "Anyhow, here he comes. The little beggar's racing, too!"
Garth came into sight, sitting very straight, with his hands well down, and with Roany going at his best hand-gallop. He took the shortest cut across the paddock, which included a fair-sized log, over which the pony hopped gaily, while both parents gasped.
"I didn't know Garth could sit that!"
"Neither did I," said Tom, with a grin. "Oh, he's developing! I wonder what's making him hurry so."