ing to believe, with him, that the hurt was trifling, she endeavored to be cheerful. Thanks, she knew, would embarrass him, so she spoke of the woods, the drought, the ball game, anything but himself. They passed over some miles without incident, until it was evident that they were approaching the village. They were near the end of the woods.

Rodman turned to her. "Peter 's tired now, and I don't think he 'll make any more trouble. It might be noticed if I drove home with you instead of-of your cousin. If I get out at the cross-roads ahead, would you mind driving home alone?"

Harriet noticed Rodman's consideration not only for her but for Brian, who so little deserved it. But in answer to his question she shook her head. "I am going," she said, "to drive you to the doctor's."

He smiled in polite opposition. "I must go to Nate's."

With a little feeling of helplessness, she realized that his will was stronger than her own. "Very well," she said. "I will drive home from the cross-roads."

Then, as they approached the joining of the roads, she felt that she could not be satisfied with saying so little. "Rodman," she began, "I must tell you how much—”

Rodman, suddenly drawing Peter into a walk, turned to Harriet. "Don't say it," he interrupted, looking squarely at her. "I know what you want to say, and I 'm glad of it, but let us just agree that I have done a little to repay you. No, don't say any more. Your cousin's right here by the cross-roads."

"Brian?" exclaimed Harriet. She looked ahead. A figure had indeed stepped out from the bushes, and had advanced into the road to meet them. In silence Brian waited, and in silence the others approached until Rodman stopped the carriage before him.

Brian's face was red and sullen. There was nothing that he could say: he knew that the others would understand that he could not go home and face the family. He had thought it easy to make his peace with Harriet, but it filled him with disgust to find her driving with Rodman. He almost wished that he had risked going on alone. He thought eagerly for some familiar, offhand way in which to claim the driver's seat. But in spite of himself he could find nothing to say, and felt that he made a shamefaced picture, waiting to see what would happen. Would that fellow give up his place?

To his relief, Rodman, handing the reins to Harriet, jumped from the runabout. Then, as

Brian prepared to climb up, Harriet moved into the right-hand seat, and motioned Brian to come around to the other side. He turned to pass in front of the horse, and, so doing, his eye fell on the clumsily repaired shaft.

"Why," he exclaimed, "that 's been broken!" Harriet did not answer; she was very indignant with him. In silence she waited while Brian took his place beside her. But then Rodman, having taken his bundles from the carriage, came and looked up at Brian.

"We broke the shaft in this way," he explained. "Back there where the road comes in from East Winton, an auto swung out in front of us, and Peter took us into the bushes, where he broke the shaft. But he quieted down; he 's pretty good if only you speak to him. I mended the break with four oak sticks; they 're easy enough to cut if you bend them at the ground and draw your knife across them. The string is twine, doubled and twisted; I used a whole ball. You can see how I made the splice." He turned to Harriet, and took off his cap.

"Good-by," he said. "Thank you for the lift." He bowed and turned away.

Harriet, lost in wonderment at his giving so much information to Brian, was forced to call after him: "Good-by. You are n't half as much obliged as I am." He threw her a smile over his shoulder, but said nothing. In a moment more, he was out of sight among the bushes, and Harriet drove on.

Not a word did she say to Brian. She was so out of patience with him that she scarcely thought of his humiliation and his regret. He stole glances at her face, and found it unforgiving. Then he grew uneasy. Would she tell? When they were close to the house, he ventured to speak.

"Harriet, had n't I better drive?"

"No!" she answered firmly. With her little chin set determinedly, she drove the remaining distance and turned in at the gate. Standing on the piazza were her father and mother, Bob, and Pelham. As she stopped the horse, the coachman came and took the bridle.

Pelham came running down the steps. "You people had the best of it," he cried. "There was no game. We waited an hour, and then the other team telephoned that they 'd broken down on the road." He helped Harriet from the carriage. She was in no mood to respond, but forced herself to do so. "I'm sorry, Pelham. I suppose we had all the fun." She had suddenly begun to wonder how the broken shaft was to be explained. Could Brian escape any longer?

"So you lost nothing, Brian," went on Pelham.

Brian answered something, Harriet did not hear what, for she was giving the package to her father. What she did hear was the sudden remark of the coachman :

"You 've been breakin' of the shaft." "H'm!" said Mr. Dodd. "And spliced it too. How did it all happen?"

Shrinking, Harriet looked up at him. What should she say? With relief, she saw that his eye was fixed on Brian. Indeed, all were looking at him. She stepped to the door, but having reached it, turned with a little feeling of satisfaction. What would he be able to say?

Brian was red to his ears. His voice was not clear as he answered. "Back there in the woods where the road comes in from the side-the East Winton road, I think?-an automobile swung out in front of us so quick it startled Peter. He got into the bushes, and managed to break the shaft."

Pelham, who had been examining the splice, looked up in admiration. "You did well to stop him. And this bit of mending, that 's well done too!"

Brian forced a smile. "Just four oak sticks. They're quickly cut when you know how-just bend 'em down and cut at the bend. The string was too small, but we made it bigger by doubling and twisting."

Harriet choked with indignation. She saw her mother, impetuous as a girl, run down the steps and kiss Brian. It was on Harriet's lips to say, "Ask what happened at the railroad bridge." But she saw on Brian's face a hangdog look of shame, and, turning quickly, went into the house.

CHAPTER XI

PELHAM TAKES A HAND

PELHAM and Brian occupied the same room. Here, while Brian sat looking moodily out of the window, Pelham was walking up and down. He had just come from Harriet.

"Neither you nor Harriet seems to want to talk," he complained. "Now here am I as mad as I can be about that automobile-why, they might have killed you! A little farther, and you'd have been side-wiped, I should say."

“Looked like it," answered Brian. "Probably it was that big machine that passed through town an hour and a half ago. A limousine, was n't it?"

"I guess so," Brian replied. Pelham stopped in his walk. know?"

"Don't you

"My dear fellow," said Brian, "I had my hands full with the horse."

"Of course!" answered Pelham, resuming his tramp. "But here I am, getting angry about that automobile, while you and Harriet are as cool as fishes."

“Very natural, I should say," explained Brian. "We 're glad enough not to have been hurt."

"Well," cried Pelham, stopping again, and going to his cousin's side, "so am I! I'm just beginning to realize what might have happenedand what it might have meant. You know-” he hesitated, but then went on, "I 'm beginning to wonder what I'd have done if Harriet had been hurt. You saw how Mother felt?" "Yes," mumbled Brian. His aunt's kiss still burned his cheek like fire.

"Father does n't say much," went on Pelham, "but he was really scared." Pelham put his hand on Brian's shoulder. "Harriet never could have managed the horse herself. Brian, we 're all tremendously obliged to you."

Brian rose suddenly. "That 's all right, Pelham. Only—well, just let 's forget it. It's-Iit's nothing, you know."

Pelham looked at his cousin, who was not looking at him. He clapped Brian on the back, and laughed. "You need n't be ashamed of it, you know. Well, we 'll drop it."

"No hope of any base-ball?" asked Brian, hurriedly.

"I'm waiting to do an errand for Father," Pelham said. "But I told the fellows I thought we could have a scrub game about four." "Good!" cried Brian.

Bob, whose steps had been sounding on the stairs and in the hallway, now looked into the room. "Pelham," he said, tossing a package at his brother, "take that over to the office, will you? Father and I won't be through with that letter for another fifteen minutes, but Brian will mail it, I guess. And then you can have your game." He disappeared.

Pelham, stuffing the package into his pocket, started for the door. "That will just give me enough time to call a couple of fellows who don't know that we 're to play. See you at the field, Brian. By the way, will you lend me your knife? Mine is so dull, and I have n't time to sharpen it.”

Brian went to the bureau. "I never carry a knife, you know. Most of us don't." Pelham stared at his cousin's back. He knew that by "us" Brian meant the boys with whom he usually associated. Now he was not surprised that city boys did not carry pocket-knives; what use had they for them? But that Brian's knife was in his bureau

"It's pretty dull, anyway," went on Brian, rummaging.

His knife dull? Pelham stared the more. Those oak sticks with which the shaft had been spliced had been cut with a sharp knife.

But Pelham said nothing. He knew that Harriet had no knife, and he wanted time to think. When Brian finally produced the knife, he saw that it was more penknife than jack-knife, scarcely capable, unless exceedingly sharp, of cutting the stout saplings. He opened it and thumbed the blade. "A little better than mine," he said. "Thanks!" He hurried away, and as he went he thought.

Brian, left to himself, began to pace up and down. The awkwardness of his position, forced to take the praise that belonged to Rodman, bothered him greatly. It was all very well to escape the blame that he deserved, and he was, when he thought of this, glad that Harriet had escaped from an accident. He believed, also, that he could have done quite as well as Rodman, had he stayed with Harriet. Indeed, he felt a little resentment against the boy who had so neatly taken his place. But he saw the dishonesty of his course, and, to do him justice, was uncomfortable in consequence. Further, he was afraid lest any moment he might betray himself. How was he to know whether that had been a limousine or a touring-car?

Quite unconscious, however, of the joint that Pelham had already found in his armor, Brian presently answered his uncle's call. Mr. Dodd was in the writing-room, with a packet in his hand. It was long and narrow, tied with string, and well plastered with postage-stamps.

"Brian," said Mr. Dodd, weighing the packet in his hand, "you see now why I sent you over to Winton to-day. Here are those papers that you brought, ready to go out again. by this afternoon's mail. I want you to take it to the post-office and register it."

Following his practice, he went on to explain to Brian: "This was a contract that you brought. After talking it all over with Bob, I have signed it. The people that I'm dealing with are new to me, and not knowing just how far I am situated

Mr. Dodd was in the habit of explaining to his children many of his acts, at least such as they themselves saw or helped him in. His belief was that whether or not the children always understood, in the long run they learned a good deal concerning matters which were valuable to them.

FROM THE BRIDGE." (SEE PAGE 410.)

from the bank, have required the usual deposit to be by certified check or else by cash. It 's too late to have the bank at Winton certify my check, so I am sending two hundred dollars in bank-bills. That is why the package must be registered, and must be insured for that amount."

Brian listened inattentively. He did not see how this could affect him, but he answered respectfully at the end, "Yes, sir."

"The mail does n't close for an hour and a half," said Mr. Dodd. "Still, I think if I were you, I'd go directly and get the matter done. The postage is correct, and you will have nothing to pay." He gave the boy the package.

"Very well, sir," said Brian. He put the packet in the side pocket of his coat, and started to leave the room.

Mr. Dodd looked after him. The long envelop stood well out of the pocket, and he called a warning: "Be careful of it, Brian."

"Yes, sir," answered Brian, and departed.

As he afterward explained, all he did was to go straight to the post-office, stopping for a few minutes on the bridge over the mill-stream. It was a very natural place to stop; a hundred people did it daily, for rushing water is always fascinating. But Brian's few minutes were longer than he thought. Frowning down into the swirling eddies, puzzling over the pitfalls that might catch him before the incidents of Harriet's drive were forgotten, he restlessly shifted from foot to foot. In so doing, he rubbed his coat against the railing, until, presently, the envelop slipped from his pocket and fell from the bridge. The noise of the water covered the sound of the fall, and Brian, still frowning, went on his way.