“Kitty? Get along, Tucker!’it’s no use your trying to scratch yourself with your hind hoof, and run at the same time.” He addressed the horse, which was executing awkward gymnastics. “Excuse me, Rose; I must dismount. There is a briar stinging Tucker.”
Jan drew up, descended, and slapped with his open hand where a horse-fly was engaged sucking blood. The fly was too wide awake to be killed; it rose, and sailed away. Then young Pooke mounted again.
“Get along, Tucker!” he said, and applied the whip.
“I mean,” pursued Rose, as if there had ensued no interruption. “I mean, after you had been treated so shamefully.”
“I didn’t know it.”
“Really, Jan! Everyone knows that Kitty refused you. It is the village talk, and everyone says it was scandalous.”
“Drat it! there is that fly again at Tucker.”
“Oh, if you can think of nothing but Tucker, I’ll be silent.”
“Don’t be cross, Rose, I must consider Tucker, as I am driver. There might be accidents.”
“Not for the world. Of course you must consider Tucker, and poor little I must be content to come into your mind in the loops and gaps not took up by the horse and the gadfly.”