"I have never been in an auto before," whispered the old creature
against a wind which made her breathless. "I have seen them pass."

"You are not afraid?"

"Oh, no!"

"Cover yourself well, well."

Gallant old women, toiling like ants upon the long stretches of road,
who, suddenly finding themselves projected through the air at a pace
they had never experienced in their lives before, would say not a word,
though the colour be whipped to their cheeks and their eyes rained tears
until, clinging to the arm of the driver: "Stop here, mademoiselle!"
they would whisper, expecting the car to rear and stop dead at their own
doorstep; and finding themselves still carried on, and half believing
themselves kidnapped: "Ah, mademoiselle, stop, stop...."

They slipped down into the pit of Briey where the houses cling to the
sides of a circular hollow, and drew up by a white house which the
Frenchman indicated.

The old woman searched, trembling and out of breath for her
handkerchief, and wiped her streaming eyes; then, as she climbed out
backwards, with feet feeling for the ground--"What do I owe you,
mademoiselle?"

"Ah, nothing, nothing."

"_Mais si_! I am not at all poor!" and leaving a twopence-halfpenny