“Your leg's not hurt, is it, Rex?” cried Nan, instantly appearing on the scene.
“I guess not. Get my crutches, please,” and Nan hurried to pull them out from under the seat of the cart.
“Why, what's all this?” asked the man, who had been leading the horse with the load of peaches.
“Oh, that old coloured boy of yours gave a peach to my pony, and then, when he choked on the pit, was too much of a coward to try and get it out and Rex turned to wither poor Jim with one of his most kingly glances, but Jim had vanished.
“I should think he would take himself off,” said Harry, indignantly. “If he'd stayed round here I would have given him a piece of my mind,” and Harry made certain significant gestures with the plumpest of fists. “Think of his letting a lame fellow like Rex come tumbling out of the cart, rather than lift his hand to help a choking pony,” and an angry red flush shot over Harry's sun-burned face.
Just at this moment Nan discovered a black curly-headed little pate directly under a hole in the platform, but with Harry at this angry pitch she did not dare to make known her discovery. Presently, when Harry and Rex were busy getting into the cart, and the man's back was turned, what did the little witch do but catch up an old tin pail near at hand, dip it half full of powdered dust from the road, and pour it down through that one small hole in the platform. There was a spluttering sound as of suppressed choking. Nan was the only one that noticed it, but her little face was sufficiently wreathed in smiles to prove that “revenge is sweet” to the “gentler sex,” though the revenger be still in pinafores.
