Moreover, after the first stretch, she slacked on the hills and fell into walks in the lonely reaches, almost as if she had learned it in a lesson.
Many a pretty girl, flushing sweetly under Jim Otis's gay smile, and perhaps under his caressing arm, had ridden behind that little canny mare, who learned well the meaning of the careless rein along the woodland roads.
However, to-day there was no careless rein.

At the first slack Madelon herself had reached the whip and touched the gently ambling neck.

"She has more speed in her than this," said she, shortly.
"She hasn't been driven for two days, either," asserted Jim Otis.
"Wake up, Molly!" He took the whip himself and flourished it with a quick little snap over her back.

In truth, Jim Otis was as anxious to be at this journey's end as Madelon, for he feared every minute lest she should ask him again if he had seen her take the knife, and that he would again have to oppose falsehood to her frantic pleading.

But Madelon had believed him.