the
fact; we haven't got the nerve now. It'd want a mint of money to help
us. And what you say's the truth--people want to see the end of us.
They want the taxis--our day's over. I'm not complaining; you asked me
about it yourself."

And for the third time he raised his whip.

"Tell me what you would have done if you had been given your fare and
just sixpence over?"

The cabman stared downward, as though puzzled by that question.

"Done? Why, nothing. What could I have done?"

"But you said that it had saved your life."

"Yes, I said that," he answered slowly; "I was feelin' a bit low. You
can't help it sometimes; it's the thing comin' on you, and no way out of
it--that's what gets over you. We try not to think about it, as a rule."

And this time, with a "Thank you, kindly!" he touched his horse's flank
with the whip. Like a thing aroused from sleep the forgotten creature
started and began to draw the cabman away from us. Very slowly they
travelled down the road among the shadows of the trees broken by
lamplight. Above us, white ships of cloud were sailing rapidly across
the dark river of sky on the wind which smelled of change. And, after
the cab was lost to sight, that wind still brought to us the dying sound
of the slow wheels.
1910.

RIDING IN MIST

Wet and hot, having her winter coat, the mare exactly matched the
drenched fox-coloured beech-leaf drifts. As was her wont on such misty
days, she danced along with head held high, her neck a little arched, her
ears pricked, pretending that things were not what they seemed, and now
and then vigorously trying to leave me planted on the air. Stones which
had rolled out of the lane banks were her especial goblins, for one such
had maltreated her nerves before she came into this ball-room world, and
she had not forgotten.

There was no wind that day. On the beech-trees were still just enough of
coppery leaves to look like fires lighted high-up to air the eeriness;
but most of the twigs, pearled with water, were patterned very naked
against universal grey. Berries were few, except the pink spindle one,
so far the most beautiful, of which there were more than Earth generally
vouchsafes. There was no sound in the deep lanes, none of that sweet,
overhead sighing of yesterday at the same hour, but there was a quality
of silence--a dumb mist murmuration. We passed a tree with a proud
pigeon sitting on its top spire, quite too heavy for the twig