He drove up, at once
assisted her to the narrow perch beside him, and with a nod to Bent
drove off. His breathless expedition relieved the leave-taking of these
young people of any ceremony.
"I suppose," said Mr. Dawson, giving a half glance over his shoulder as
they struck into the dusty highway,--"I suppose you don't care to see
anybody before you get to San Jose?"
"No-o-o," said Rose, timidly.
"And I reckon you wouldn't mind my racin' a bit if anybody kem up?"
"No."
"The mare's sort o' fastidious about takin' anybody's dust."
"Is she?" said Rose, with a faint smile.
"Awful," responded her companion; "and the queerest thing of all is, she
can't bear to have any one behind her, either."
He leaned forward with his expression of humorous enjoyment of some
latent joke and did something with the reins--Rose never could clearly
understand what, though it seemed to her that he simply lifted them with
ostentatious lightness; but the mare suddenly seemed to LENGTHEN herself
and lose her height, and the stalks of wheat on either side of the dusty
track began to melt into each other, and then slipped like a flash into
one long, continuous, shimmering green hedge.
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