Crowded Out o Crofield | Page 3

your father, and all the children? I'm so
glad they are well. Elder Holloway's to be here to-morrow. Hope you'll
all come. I shall be there myself. You've had my class a number of
times. Much obliged to you. I'll be there to-morrow. You must hear the
Elder. He's to inspect the Sunday-school."
"Your class, Miss Glidden?" began Mary; and her face suggested that
somebody was blowing upon a kind of fire inside her cheeks, and that
they would be very red in a minute.
"Yes; don't fail to be there to-morrow, Mary. The choir'll be full, of
course. I shall be there myself."
"I hope you will, Miss Glidden--"
The portly lady saw something up the street at that moment.
"Oh my! What is it? Dear me! It's coming! Run! We'll all be killed! Oh
my!"
She had turned quite around, while she was speaking, and was once
more looking up the street; but the dark-haired girl had neither flinched
nor wavered. She had only sent a curious, inquiring glance in the
direction of the shouts and the rattle and the cloud of dust that were
coming swiftly toward them.
"A runaway team," she said, quietly. "Nobody's in the wagon."

"Dear me!" exclaimed Miss Glidden; but Mary began to move away,
looking not at her but at the runaway, and she did not hear the rest.
"Mary Ogden's too uppish.--Somebody'll be killed, I know they
will!--She's got to be taken down.--There they come!--Dressed too well
for a blacksmith's daughter. Doesn't know her place.--Oh dear! I'm so
frightened!"
Perhaps she had been wise in getting behind the nearest tree. It was a
young maple, two inches through, lately set out, but it might have
stopped a pair of very small horses. Those in the road were
large--almost too large to run well. They were well-matched grays, and
they came thundering along in a way that was really fine to behold;
heads down, necks arched, nostrils wide, reins flying, the wagon behind
them banging and swerving--no wonder everybody stood still and,
except Mary Ogden, shouted, "Stop 'em!" One young fellow, across the
street, stood still only until the runaways were all but close by him.
Then he darted out into the street, not ahead of them but behind them.
No man on earth could have stopped those horses by standing in front
of them. They could have charged through a regiment. Their heavy,
furious gallop was fast, too, and the boy who was now following them,
must have been as light of foot as a young deer.
"Hurrah! Hurrah! Go it, Jack! Catch 'em! Bully for you!" arose from a
score of people along the sidewalk, as he bounded forward.
"It's Jack! Oh dear me! But it's just like him! There! He's in!"
exclaimed Mary Ogden, her dark eyes dancing proudly.
"Why, it's that good-for-nothing brother of Mary Ogden. He's the
blacksmith's boy. I'm afraid he will be hurt," remarked Miss Glidden,
kindly and benevolently; but all the rest shouted "Hurrah!" again.
Fierce was the strain upon the young runner, for a moment, and then
his hands were on the back-board of the bouncing wagon. A tug, a
spring, a swerve of the wagon, and Jack Ogden was in it, and in a
second more the loosely flying reins were in his hands.
The strong arms of his father, were they twice as strong, could not at

once have pulled in those horses, and one man on the sidewalk seemed
to be entirely correct when he said, "He's a plucky little fellow, but he
can't do a thing, now he's there."
[Illustration: The Runaway.]
His sister was trembling all over, but she was repeating: "He did it
splendidly! He can do anything!"
Jack, in the wagon, was thinking only: "I know 'em. They're old
Hammond's team. They'll try to go home to the mill. They'll smash
everything, if I don't look out!"
It is something, even to a greatly frightened horse, to feel a hand on the
rein. The team intended to turn out of Main Street, at the corner, and
they made the turn, but they did not crash the wagon to pieces against
the corner post, because of the desperate guiding that was done by Jack.
The wagon swung around without upsetting. It tilted fearfully, and the
nigh wheel was in the air for a moment, until Jack's weight helped
bring it down again. There was a short, sharp scream across the street,
when the wagon swung and the wheel went up.
Down the slope toward the bridge thundered the galloping team, and
the blacksmith ran out of his shop to see it pass.
"Turn them into the creek, Jack!" he shouted, but there was no time for
any answer.
"They'd smash through the bridge," thought Jack. "I know what I'm