Nurses scurried hither and thither, gathering up their charges. Men stood in the middle of the street, shouting and sawing their arms, waving hats, umbrellas, handkerchiefs, but getting out of the way just in time to let the more and more frantic horses pass; while troops of boys came rushing down every cross-street, their eyes a-glitter with barbaric joy, and shouting back the glad tidings to their toiling but shorter-legged comrades in the rear.
Where do all the boys come from?
But wild with terror as they were, the horses turned up the cross-street along which they had been driven earlier in the afternoon,—the one, that is, intersecting Leigh one block above the Carters’,—and up this they rushed with a terrific clatter.
Meanwhile, I had not been idle. Immediately upon the fall of our charioteer and the bounding forward of the horses, both girls had sprung to their feet with a cry of horror; but I shouted to them to sit down, and they obeyed. Alice, however, with every jolt of unusual severity would rise and attempt to leap from the vehicle, and again and again I had to seize her and thrust her back into her seat. Lucy, on the contrary, gave me no further trouble. Ashy pale, with her hands clasped, she sat trembling and silent, her appealing eyes fixed upon me. At last I insisted upon their sitting upon the floor of the carriage, assuring them, in as confident a tone as I could muster, that there was no earthly danger if they would but resolutely hold that position; and in this, too, they obeyed me, though in Alice’s case I had to supplement my commands by a firm grip upon her shoulder.
At last, when we were approaching Leigh Street at a furious pace, and the horses were turning into it, a well-meaning man rushed, with a loud “whoa,” at the horse nearest him, at the same time belaboring him with his umbrella; and this producing an extra burst of speed, the carriage made the turn literally on two wheels; so that, in momentary expectation of an upset, I instinctively released my hold on Alice’s shoulder and seized the edge of my seat; while the girls were so frightened that Alice sprang up, and, with a wild cry, threw her arms around my neck, Lucy, at the same time, seizing my right arm.
The two girls pulling down upon me with all the strength of panic-terror, there was no help for it. My heels flew up in the air, my legs assuming the shape of a gigantic V.
Picture to yourself, gentle reader, Mr. Fat Whacker moving down Leigh Street in this alphabetical order!
Even had I not been throttled almost to suffocation, I believe my face would have been red with shame,—often a more powerful emotion than the fear of death. (I, for example, once saw an officer, while the battle of Spottsylvania Court-House was raging, blush, instead of turning pale, when a cannon-ball, rushing past him, annihilated the seat of his trousers.)
And this is what I saw, looking through that V as a sharpshooter through the hind-sight of his rifle.
I saw the Don and Laura cosily sitting on the carriage-block, with their backs towards us, the nurse standing near by. Molly saw us as soon as we turned into Leigh Street, and knowing the horses, I suppose (all recognition of me being, I must presume, out of the question), rushed up to the Don with a scream. He leaped to his feet, and, taking in the situation at a glance, sprang into the middle of the street.