“Helen and I are going in my car. Does anyone want to occupy the back seat?” asked George Wright, hoping he would be paid for his politeness by a refusal.
“No indeed, I adore a hay wagon! It’s so nice and informal,” cried Tillie.
Douglas did want to go, but felt perhaps it was up to her to chaperone the youngsters in the hay wagon, so for once Dr. Wright thought he was to get Helen for a few moments to himself.
“Chloe must go with us,” declared Helen. “She wants to stop in Paradise to see her mother.”
Dr. Wright cracked a grim joke to himself which concerned Chloe and the antipodes of Paradise, but he smothered his feelings and opened the door for the delighted colored girl, who had never been in an automobile before.
What a gay crowd they were in that hay wagon! Billy Sutton had contrived to get Nan on the front seat with him, where she was enthroned high above the others, looking down on the horses’ backs as they strained and pulled the great wagon through the half-frozen mud. Billy had some friends out from town who immediately attached themselves to Tillie Wingo, who was to beaux just as a honey-pot to bees. They stopped and picked up two families of young folks on the way to the count’s, and by the time they got them all in, the wagon was quite full.
“I am glad Helen didn’t trust her new dress to this,” Douglas whispered to Lewis.
“Well, I am glad you didn’t have on such fine clothes and came this way,” he whispered back. “Wright is too reckless for me on these country roads. Not that I am afraid myself, but I certainly should hate to see you turned over.”
“Whar Miss Ellanlouise?” asked Chloe, when she could get her breath after the first mad plunge into the delights of motoring.
“Oh, there! How selfish of me! I should have thought of it and asked them to go with us,” said Helen.