Page:Saxe Holm's Stories, Series Two.djvu/113

Rh "Ye see, Miss Fanny," he said, "John Bassett's horses aint like ourn. They wont stand a minute."

"What, are n't these horses quiet?" screamed Aunt Jane. "I sha'n't go a step. Maria, this man 's brought skittish horses; we 'll have our necks broken, and these country people never do know anything about driving."

Luke could not bear this.

"Well, mum," he said, "if you say that after you 've driven with John Bassett, I 'll eat my head. There aint no circus man can do any more with horses than John can. His horse plays hide-and-seek with him in the yard, just like a boy,—you 'd oughter see it."

Fanny Lane listened with delight.

"Oh, how charming!" she said, with one of her bewildering smiles bent full on Luke. "What good luck it was, Luke, that you found such a nice driver for us, and such nice horses! How did it happen that he was not engaged?"

The truth was very near escaping from Luke's lips in spite of himself; he was so tickled at the idea of John's being "engaged" as a "driver;" but he prudently choked both his laughter and the truth together and answered diplomatically:— "Oh, he would n't drive for everybody, John would n't,"—which was certainly true, though it served Luke's purpose as well as a lie.

When Luke, with some confusion and mixing up of genders and pronouns, had succeeded in