others, in particular Ruth's brother Bailey, who regarded his aunt with
a dislike and suspicion akin to that which a stray dog feels towards
the boy who saunters towards him with a tin can in his hand.

To Bailey, his strong-minded relative was a perpetual menace, a sort of
perambulating yellow peril, and the fact that she often alluded to him
as a worm consolidated his distaste for her.

* * * * *

Mrs. Porter released the clutch and set out on her drive. She rarely
had a settled route for these outings of hers, preferring to zigzag
about New York, livening up the great city at random. She always drove
herself and, having, like a good suffragist, a contempt for male
prohibitions, took an honest pleasure in exceeding a man-made speed
limit.

One hesitates to apply the term "joy-rider" to so eminent a leader of
contemporary thought as the authoress of "The Dawn of Better Things,"
"Principles of Selection," and "What of To-morrow?" but candour compels
the admission that she was a somewhat reckless driver. Perhaps it was
due to some atavistic tendency. One of her ancestors may have been a
Roman charioteer or a coach-racing maniac of the Regency days. At any
rate, after a hard morning's work on her new book she felt that her
mind needed cooling, and found that the rush of air against her face
effected this satisfactorily. The greater the rush, the quicker the
cooling. However, as the alert inhabitants of Manhattan Island, a hardy
race trained from infancy to dodge taxicabs and ambulance wagons, had
always removed themselves from her path with their usual agility, she
had never yet had an accident.