On the front seat was a rather demure-looking girl of fourteen, whose general air of youthful anxiety suggested that she was more or less in charge of the party. Beside her was a dark-haired boy about a year younger.
“ ‘Fat, flabby and fractious,’ that’s what you ought to be labelled,” one of his boy cousins had declared at starting, and, though it was an ungracious remark, and not likely to improve Andrew Durand’s temper, yet even in the excitement of arrival, he still did not look, well—quite the reverse of his cousin’s description.
Not only had he taken the lion’s share of the front seat of the fly, but he had almost monopolised the back one too; first, with his feet, which he had comfortably disposed in a line with his indolent overgrown person, and secondly, with his innumerable possessions.
Amongst these was a canary in a cage, a guinea-pig in a box, a huge butterfly net—its extra long handle making it an undesirable addition to luggage—sundry tin cases, with unpleasantly sharp corners, a geological hammer and various tools of a kindred nature, a violin, along with divers other items, which contributed to form the pile of non-squeezable luggage, beside which poor little Marion, the third passenger, had to accommodate herself as best she might.
“Nonsense, she has heaps of room for her size,” Andrew had ruled at starting from the station, when the others had remonstrated with him; “How much more can an infant like that want?”
Marion, commonly known as Marygold, perched herself very contentedly on the edge of the seat, and, always ready to make the best of a situation, announced cheerily:
“I ’spect I’ll manage somehow, for all my hair can sit on the air,” and certainly the cloud of golden hair that surrounded the sweet-tempered little face did seem the most important part of her very small person.
Fly No. 2 was more closely packed. It contained Jack and Phil Kenyon, schoolboy brothers of eleven and ten; their cousin, Diana Durand, who was ten years old yesterday; Tryphoena Kenyon, always called Phoena, who was just a year younger than Di; and last of all, six-year old Hubert, the youngest of the Kenyons.
He was so small that, when the cheering began he jumped up on the seat, for he felt that otherwise he might be overlooked, and he flung his hat so frantically into the air that the latter fell into the road and he himself toppled into Di’s arms.
“Here, hurry up, Miss Annie,” cried Phil, coming to the door of the first fly; “don’t you see that your old go-cart’s stopping the way? I say, can’t you give a hand to Faith and help her with all that pile of rubbish? You don’t mean to tell me that she’s been nursing that bowl of gold-fish all the way from the station?”