just rest a spell."

I could not demur, though my impatience was urging me on faster than
his hungry horses could go.

"I told Susan," he said, "to put me up a bit of pie and cheese--mebbe
we wouldn't be back afore night. Won't you hev' some?--there's a
plenty."

But I declined the luncheon, and while he munched away contentedly,
and while the horses crunched their corn, I got out and walked on,
telling Hiram to follow at his leisure. My heart beat fast as I espied
a wagon in the distance with one--yes, two--Shaker bonnets in it.
Bessie in masquerade! Perhaps so--it could not be the other: that
would be too horrible. But she was coming, surely coming, and the cold
prim sister had told the truth, after all.

The wagon came nearer. In it were two weather-beaten dames, neither of
whom could possibly be mistaken for Bessie in disguise; and the lank,
long-haired brother who was driving them looked ignorant as a child of
anything save the management of his horses. I hailed them, and the
wagon drew up at the side of the road.

It was the women who answered in shrill, piping voices: "Ben to
Watervliet? Nay, they'd ben driving round the country, selling garden
seeds."

"Did they know Bessie Stewart, who was staying in the Shaker village,
in the house by the bridge?"