"Well, if only you'd taken a little more time. But not you, not old Pat Travis. By damn, Pat, you came in here like a downhill locomotive, it ain't my fault—"
"Hort, straighten it out. What's not your fault?"
Horton sighed.
"Listen, it's a long story. I've got a buggy over here to take you into town. They're puttin' you up at a hotel so you can look the place over. I'll tell you on the way in."
"The heck with that," Dahlinger said indignantly, "we want to see the man."
"You're not goin' to see the man, sonny," Horton said patiently, "You are, as a matter of fact, the last people on the planet the man wants to see right now."
Dahlinger started to say something but Travis shut him up. He told Trippe to stay with the ship and took Dahlinger with him. At the end of the field was a carriage straight out of Seventeenth Century England. And the things that drew it—if you closed your eyes—looked reasonably similar to horses. The three men climbed aboard. There was no driver. Horton explained that the 'horses' would head straight for the hotel.
"Well all right," Travis said, "what's the story?"
"Don't turn those baby browns on me," Horton said gloomily, "I would have warned you if I could, but you know the law says we can't show favoritism...."
Travis decided the best thing to do was wait with as much patience as possible. After a while Horton had apologized thoroughly and completely, although what had happened was certainly not his fault, and finally got on with the tale.