"Good-morning, Miss Prue," called a boyish voice.
"Good-morning," snapped the woman, and jerked the reins again.
Miss Prue awoke then to the sudden realization that if the other's speed
had accelerated, so, too, had her own.
"Ann, Ann, whoa!" she commanded. Then she turned angry eyes on the young
man. "Go by--go by! Why don't you go by?" she called sharply.
In obedience, young Joyce touched the whip to his gray mare: but he did
not go by. With a curious little shake, as if casting off years of dull
propriety, Jupiter Ann thrust forward his nose and got down to business.
Miss Prue grew white, then red. Her hands shook on the reins.
"Ann, Ann, whoa! You mustn't--you can't! Ann, please whoa!" she
supplicated wildly. She might as well have besought the wind not to
blow.
On and on, neck and neck, the horses raced. Miss Prue's bonnet slipped
and hung rakishly above one ear. Her hair loosened and fell in
straggling wisps of gray to her shoulders. Her eyeglasses dropped from
her nose and swayed dizzily on their slender chain. Her gloves split
across the back and showed the white, tense knuckles. Her breath came in
gasps, and only a moaning "whoa--whoa" fell in jerky rhythm from her
white lips. Ashamed, frightened, and dismayed, Miss Prue clung to the
reins and kept her straining eyes on the road ahead.
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