Dick laughed.
"One o' them others got a worse," he answered, and went in search of Tod Sloan.
CHAPTER XVII.
THE UNICORN.
When Sam Bunce returned, he had a straw in one corner of his mouth, and was leading a sturdy roadster, with whom he seemed already on terms of intimacy.
Mr. Dixon Mallaby, meantime, had introduced himself to Amaryllis, getting, for his pains, but the Araminta of the sun-bonnet; and Dick, when he and the ostler had harnessed Tod in his lonely distinction, went round to find her the centre of an admiring group competing, it seemed, for her company in the brake; the girl answering with "Na-ay!" "Na-ay, thank 'ee kindly," and "Thank 'ee, sir, Ah'll ask feyther," with a genuine flush on her face due to fear of speech rather than of men, which did much to heighten her attraction for these kindly labourers and mechanics.
"You be set on box 'long o' me," said Dick, and took her not too gently by the arm.
But his way was barred by a red-faced cricketer in strange flannels.
"'Tis not every Ecclesthorpe fixture," he said, "as we gets a comely wench for maascot. Us be trustin' our hossflesh to you——"