Ahead,Laddie and the Princess fairly tried themselves.She hadn't put on her hat or habit after all.When Laddie told her they were going to lead,she said:"Very well!Then I shall go as I am.The dress makes no difference.It's the first time I've had a chance to spoil one since I left England."When the other girls saw what she was going to do,nearly every one of them left off their hats and riding skirts.Every family had saddle horses those days,and when the riders came racing up they looked like flying flowers,they were all laughing,bloom ladened,singing and calling jokes.Ahead,Laddie and the Princess just plain showed off.Her horse came from England with them,and Laddie said it had Arab blood in it,like the one in the Fourth Reader poem,"Fret not to roam the desert now,With all thy winged speed,"and the Princess loved her horse more than that man did his.She said she'd starve before she'd sell it,and if her family were starving,she'd go to work and earn food for them,and keep her horse.Laddie's was a Kentucky thoroughbred he'd saved money for years to buy;and he took a young one and trained it himself,almost like a circus horse.
Both of them COULD ride;so that day they did.They ran those horses neck and neck,right up the hill approaching Groveville,until they were almost from sight,then they whirled and came sweeping back fast as the wind.The Princess'eyes were like dead coals,and her black curls streamed,the thin silk dress wrapped tight around her and waved back like a gossamer web such as spiders spin in October.Laddie's hair was blowing,his cheeks and eyes were bright,and with one eye on the Princess--she didn't need it--and one on the road,he cut curves,turned,wheeled,and raced,and as he rode,so did she.
"Will they break their foolish necks?"wailed mother.
"They are the handsomest couple I ever have seen in my life!"said father.
"Yes,and you two watch out,or you'll strike trouble right there,"said Sally,leaning forward.
I gave her an awful nudge.It made me so happy I could have screamed to see them flying away together like that.
"Well,if that girl represents trouble,"said father,"God knows it never before came in such charming guise.""You can trust a man to forget his God and his immortal soul if a sufficiently beautiful woman comes along,"said my mother dryly,and all of them laughed.
She didn't mean that to be funny,though.You could always tell by the set of her lips and the light in her eyes.
Just this side of Groveville we passed a man on horseback.He took off his hat and drew his horse to one side when Laddie and the Princess rode toward him.He had a big roll of papers under his arm,to show that he had been for his mail.But I knew,so did Laddie and the Princess,that he had been compelled to saddle and ride like mad,to reach town and come that far back in time to watch us pass;for it was the Princess'father,and WATCH was exactly what he was doing;he wanted to see for himself.Laddie and the Princess rode straight at him,neck and neck,and then both of them made their horses drop on their knees and they waved a salute,and then they were up and away.Of course father and mother saw,so mother bowed,and father waved his whip as we passed.He sat there like he'd turned the same on horseback as Sabethany had in her coffin;but he had to see almost a mile of us driving our best horses and carriages,wearing our wedding garments and fine raiment,and all that "cavalcade,"father called it,of young,reckless riders.You'd have thought if there were a hint of a smile in his whole being it would have shown when Sally leaned from the carriage to let him see that her face and clothes were as good as need be and smiled a lovely smile on him,and threw him a rose.He did leave his hat off and bow low,and then Shelley,always the very dickens for daring,rode right up to him and laughed in his face,and she leaned and thrust a flower into his bony hands;you would have thought he would have been simply forced to smile then,but he looked far more as if he would tumble over and roll from the saddle.My heart ached for a man in trouble like that.I asked the Lord to preserve us from secrets we couldn't tell the neighbours!
At the station there wasn't a thing those young people didn't do.
They tied flowers and ribbons all over Sally's satchel and trunk.
They sowed rice as if it were seeding time in a wheatfield.They formed a circle around Sally and Peter and as mushy as ever they could they sang,"As sure as the grass grows around the stump,You are my darling sugar lump,"while they danced.They just smiled all the time no matter what was done to them.Some of it made me angry,but I suppose to be pleasant was the right way.
Sally was strong on always doing the right thing,so she just laughed,and so did all of us.Going home it was wilder yet,for all of them raced and showed how they could ride.
