George Brayton had been guilty of the most natural thing in the world that afternoon. He had spent the whole morning among his books, retorts, air-pumps, and other matters, over at the Academy building, and he desired something else for a change.

That was his first visit to Ogleport, but, although well aware that there was plenty of fine scenery in the neighborhood, he had thus far made no further acquaintance with it than he had gained from the stage, as he was pulled through the clouds of dust on the north road the day of his arrival.

The young “assistant” had therefore deliberately planned a sort of tour of investigation behind a fast horse, and he meant to have a good many more of the sort. In fact, he had entered into a commercial treaty with the one livery stable of Ogleport, down at Runner’s Tavern, to[Pg 255] supply him from time to time with all the fast horses that he might need.

So far, so good, but how can a young man enjoy fine scenery with no companion but a horse?

Not very well, indeed, and, besides all that, there was nothing selfish about George Brayton, and he had instantly determined to share his first drive with merry Effie Dryer.

He forgot, truly, to ask Effie’s stepmother for her permission, and had impudently driven up to the Doctor’s house after dinner, and proposed to wait until Miss Euphemia should complete any necessary preliminaries.

And Euphemia?

Dear little soul! She never once thought of refusing, nor did she waste any great amount of time over her simple toilet, but was ready with a promptness which went to George’s very heart, as anything so rare as that is quite likely to.

And Mrs. Dryer sat with Brayton in the parlor, during those few minutes, and smiled on him in a way that showed to perfection the artwork of her dentist, but which did not disclose an atom of the gall and wormwood with which[Pg 256] her heart had been stirred up when she saw him hitch his horse in front of the gate.

It is barely possible that Effie knew more about it than Brayton, or why should she have man?uvred with such graceful swiftness and such entire success to get into the parlor first?

By the time Mrs. Dryer came, also, Effie had accepted the invitation to drive and “gone for her things,” although, as the former smilingly explained to George, “the Dorcas Society was to meet that afternoon, and Euphemia would be very much missed.”

And he had calmly replied,

“I should think likely she might. I never saw a young lady who seemed to be more of a general favorite. She’s a kind of sunbeam.”

“How poetical you are!” exclaimed Mrs. Dryer. “I see you have one of Mr. Runner’s horses. A bad sort of a man, they say.”

“Good judge of horses, though,” replied George. “It’s a pity so many good men don’t seem to know what a horse is.”

“Yes, indeed,” said Mrs. Dryer, “but there’s always seemed to me to be a great deal of wickedness about horses.”

[Pg 257]“There she comes,” was Brayton’s next remark, and it referred to the rustle of Effie’s dress on the stairs, not to any preposterous action on the part of Runner’s fast mare at the gate.

Now it happened that George Brayton had been a lover of horses from his youth up, and many a pleasant hour and mile he had passed behind his four-footed favorites, but his memory failed to bring him up the ghost of a more enjoyable drive than he took that afternoon.

Such a guide was Effie Dryer!

She knew just where to go, and her “driver” turned into highways and byways, most submissively, at her slightest bidding.

What surprised George most of all, however, was to find how very much of womanly common sense and genuine intelligence lay hidden beneath Effie’s unfailing flow of high spirits.

Her smile did not in the least degree resemble the ready “lip service” of her stepmother, and it could give place in a moment to a very serious and earnest sort of meaning, and George Brayton caught himself, before long, suggesting subjects of talk and turning over one idea after another, for no better reason than simply to watch[Pg 258] the shadows chase the sunshine on Euphemia Dryer’s face.

A very dangerous sort of amusement for a young man to indulge in. At all events, when the drive had lasted longer than the sober-minded Mrs. Dryer would have at all approved—the very thought of it had soured the Dorcas Society for her all that afternoon—George Brayton delivered Effie at her father’s door, took back the fast mare to Runner’s stable, and then walked up the main street of Ogleport with an idea that it was in every way a pleasanter sort of village than he had hitherto imagined.

He reached the green just as the boys—an unusually large crowd of them—were winding up a tremendous game of baseball.

“Been a tough one, I should say,” remarked George to himself. “Looks as if every fourth boy had tried to catch the ball in his mouth and got it on his nose. I begin to wonder how Zeb Fuller would look without a black eye. Bar and Val, though, seem to have escaped. I must put Bar through his Greek to-night. He can’t have fished to-day quite long enough to learn the grammar by heart. He’s a remarkable boy.”

[Pg 259]If Brayton had been within hearing just after the Rev. Dr. Solomon Dryer left the green that afternoon, his admiration might have been transferred to Zebedee Fuller himself, for that cautious youth had followed up his magnanimous surrender by saying:

“Look here, boys. We’ve had our boxing lesson, but it won’t do now not to do up our baseball. Old Sol mustn’t be allowed a peg to hang his hat on. Our you............