Page:C N and A M Williamson - The Lightning Conductor.djvu/187

 "And you won't feel that it is lack of trust in you, if he drives part of the time?"

At this Aunt Mary glared, but that Angel paid not the slightest attention.

There is an unwritten law that a man shall not be a brute; and after her sweet consideration of my chauffery feelings I couldn't show myself ungracious. I assured her that I should not feel hurt, and that she was very kind to think of me at all. I would do my best for the party, unless, of course, my services would be superfluous, now that she was to be accompanied by a friend who was a competent driver.

I wonder what I should have done in the unlikely event that she took me at my word? Picture my feelings, bereft of my Goddess, bereft of my Napier at one and the same time, constrained to resignation, while a confounded impostor drove off with both from under my very nose! Miss Randolph hastened to deny any such thought, and to impress upon me my value as a chauffeur. But things are bad enough as they are.

Here I am saddled with a fellow who hates me as a cur hates a man who has thrashed him, and will snap if he dares. Instead of turning my back upon him, I have to carry him away on it; and if a rod isn't in pickle for me, I'm not

Your old friend,