You CANNOT go
on carrying it."

She turned to me with a flash of her eyes. "What! You are a man," she
broke out, "and you ask a woman to save her life by abandoning a baby!
Hubert, you shame me!"

I felt she was right. If she had been capable of giving it up, she would
not have been Hilda. There was but one other way left.

"Then YOU must take the pony," I called out, "and let me have the
bicycle!"

"You couldn't ride it," she called back. "It is a woman's machine,
remember."

"Yes, I could," I replied, without slowing. "It is not much too short;
and I can bend my knees a bit. Quick, quick! No words! Do as I tell
you!"

She hesitated a second. The child's weight distressed her. "We should
lose time in changing," she answered, at last, doubtful but still
pedalling, though my hand was on the rein, ready to pull up the pony.

"Not if we manage it right. Obey orders! The moment I say 'Halt,' I
shall slacken my mare's pace. When you see me leave the saddle, jump off
instantly, you, and mount her! I will catch the machine before it falls.
Are you ready? Halt, then!"

She obeyed the word without one second's delay. I slipped off, held
the bridle, caught the bicycle, and led it instantaneously. Then I ran
beside the pony--bridle in one hand, machine in the other--till Hilda
had sprung with a light bound into the stirrup. At that, a little leap,
and I mounted the bicycle. It was all done nimbly, in less time than the
telling takes, for we are both of us naturally quick in our
movements. Hilda rode like a man, astride--her short, bicycling skirt,
unobtrusively divided in front and at the back, made this easily
possible. Looking behind me with a hasty glance, I could see that
the savages, taken aback, had reined in to deliberate at our unwonted
evolution. I feel sure that the novelty of the iron horse, with a
woman riding it, played not a little on their superstitious fears; they
suspected, no doubt, this was some ingenious new engine of war
devised against them by the unaccountable white man; it might go off
unexpectedly in their faces at any moment. Most of them, I observed, as
they halted, carried on their backs black ox-hide shields, interlaced
with white thongs; they were armed with two or three assegais apiece and
a knobkerry.

Instead of losing time by the change, as it turned out, we had actually
gained it. Hilda was able to put on my sorrel to her full pace, which
I had not dared to do, for fear of outrunning