Page:Watts Mumford--Whitewash.djvu/17

 of Auray, in full regalia, swung from side to side in the jostling mass, like a distressed ship in a human sea. Reclining on the threadbare velvet cushions, four girls, of obviously foreign extraction, volleyed with assorted cameras on the crowd about them. Many shrank from the black boxes in fear of witchcraft, others, more experienced in the ways of strangers, grinned broadly or became suddenly petrified into awkwardness. From their coign of vantage the cameras continued to snap with regardless vehemence.

"Hold on, stop the driver! I want to take that ditch full of horrors," exclaimed the smallest of the quartette, a slim, blonde girl of eighteen or twenty, who answered cheerfully to the nick name of "Shorty."

A red-haired young woman rose from her seat.

"Oh, gorgeous person on the box-seat, have the obligeance to restrain Bucephalus."

The peasant grinned, and obeying her gesture, which was the only thing he understood, caused so sudden a halt, that the occupants of the Empire coach fell violently into each other's arms. Upon the stopping of the carriage, an immediate con- 13