THE LEVER
I
The girl leaned forward impulsively from the leisurely moving victoria and looked back at the automobile which whizzed by the carriage, along the maple-lined road leading from Washington to Chevy Chase; then she as suddenly resumed her former position when she discovered that the young man, who was the only occupant of the motor-car, had slowed down and was gazing back at her.
"How impertinent!" she exclaimed, flushing, addressing herself rather than the older woman beside her. "Of course, it couldn't be Allen; but if it wasn't, why was he looking back at me? Did you recognize him, Eleanor?"
"Who's impertinent?" queried Patricia, who sat between them and exercised a ten-year-old sister's prerogative.
Mrs. Gorham was quietly amused. "Which question shall I answer first,
Alice—and who is 'Allen' supposed to be?"
It was the girl's turn to sense the situation. "How ridiculous!" she laughed. "Of course you wouldn't know. Allen Sanford and I used to play together when we were children in Pittsburgh. I haven't seen him since we moved away after mamma died; but that really looked like him. I wonder if by any chance it could be?"
"Oh, Alice, he's coming back," announced Patricia from her point of vantage on her knees, and a moment later the same automobile, driven at a speed at which the most conscientious of traffic guardians could not complain, passed them slowly at the left. The young man made an effort to conceal the fact that he was surveying the girl in the victoria, but Alice cut short his suspense.
"It is! it is!" she cried, eagerly; and with the recognition made certain the boy shut off his power, and, springing out of the car, was beside her before even the discreet coachman could draw up to the curb.
"I thought I couldn't be mistaken—" he began.