n on the arm with which he held
the umbrella over us; there were five different forms of insect-life
represented on it, but I remember them all.

"I'm afraid you haven't enjoyed yourself very much," said Miss Lowder,
looking at me rather critically.

"I? why--no, perhaps not; I don't generally enjoy myself very much."

Somebody out on the front seat laughed very shrilly at this: of course
it was Mary Leighton, who was sitting beside Kilian, who drove. I felt I
would have liked to push her over among the horses, and drive on.

"Isn't her voice like a steel file?" I said with great simplicity to my
companions. The dissatisfied man, writhing uncomfortably on his seat,
four inches too narrow for any one but a child of six, assented
gloomily. Miss Lowder, who was twenty-eight years old and very well
bred, looked disapproving, and changed the subject. Not much more was
said after this. Miss Lowder had a neuralgic headache, developed by the
cold wind and an undigested dinner eaten irregularly. She was too polite
to mention her sufferings, but leaned back in the carriage and
was silent.

My vis-a-vis was at last relieved by the declining sun from his task,
and so the umbrella-arm and its sleeve-button were removed from my range
of vision.

We counted the mile-posts, and we looked sometimes at our watches, and
so the time wore away.

Kilian and Mary Leighton were chattering incessantly, and did not pay
much attention to us. Kilian drove pretty fast almost all the way, but
sometimes forgot himself when Mary was too seductive, and let the horses
creep along like snails.

"There's our little tavern," cried Kilian at last, starting up the
horses.

"Oh, I'm so sorry," murmured Mary Leighton, "we have had such a lovely
drive."

My vis-a-vis groaned and looked at me as this observation reached us. I
laughed a little hysterically: I was so glad to be at the half-way
house--and Mary Leighton's words were so absurd. When we got out of the
carriage, the dissatisfied man stretched his long English limbs out, and
lighting his cigar, began silently to pace the bricks in front of
the house.

Kilian took us into the little parlor (we were the first to arrive), and
committed us to the care of a thin, tired-looking woman, and then went
to see to the comfort of his horses.

The tired woman, who looked as if she never had sat down since she grew
up, took us to some rooms, where we were to rest till tea was ready. The
rooms had been