Page:Leah Reed--Brenda's summer at Rockley.djvu/68

54 satisfaction. Fortunately there were no other passengers in the omnibus, so that there was no one present to criticise the sight of two well-dressed young girls kneeling on  the floor of an omnibus to pick up a purseful of pennies  for a stout working- woman. Just as they had finished their self-imposed task, two or three other passengers  came into the omnibus, but the girls paid little attention  to them. They were looking out of the window. It was low tide, and horses and carriages were driving on the  hard sands of the broad and beautiful beach. There were only a few bathers in the surf, and not many persons to  be seen around the flimsily built hotel and restaurants. When they reached the peninsula of Little Nahant, there was less of interest to see, and the two friends began to  talk (or perhaps chatter would be the truer word) after the fashion of girls. At last they were startled by the driver’s inquiry.

“Was you going over to the beach?”

“Why, no,” replied Brenda; “we ’re going to Mr. Pounder’s cottage. Green Gables; don’t you pass it?”

“Not by a mile or so,” replied the driver, with the independence of the true-born Yankee. “’T ain’t on our rout [sic].”

“But can’t you take us there?”

“No, indeed, miss, not now. We run on sche-dule time, and it would n’t do for me to make no changes. You see it is n’t my team,” he added, noticing the look of disappointment on the faces of the two girls.

“What shall we do?” asked Brenda with some anxiety.