cart,
began to be a bit doggy. He knew the little thing's age and weight,
but, really, when you take a girl out for a Sunday spin you want more
information about her than that. Her asked her name, and her name was
Jenkins--Ada. She was the great Jenkins's daughter.

('Oh,' thought Ellis, 'the deuce you are!')

'Father's gone to Manchester for the day, and aunt's looking after me,'
said Ada.

'Do they know you've come out--like this?'

'Not much!' She laughed deliciously. 'How lovely it is!'

At Knype they drew up before the Five Towns Hotel and descended. The
Five Towns Hotel is the greatest hotel in North Staffordshire. It has
two hundred rooms. It would not entirely disgrace Northumberland Avenue.
In the Five Towns it is august, imposing, and unique. They had a
lemonade there, and proceeded. A clock struck; it was a near thing. No
more refreshments now until they had passed the three-mile limit!

Yes! Not two hundred yards further on she spied an ice-cream shop in
Fleet Road, and Ellis learnt that she adored ice-cream. The mare waited
patiently outside in the thronged street.

After that the pilgrimage to Sneyd was punctuated with ice-creams. At
the Stag at Sneyd (where, among ninety-and-nine dogcarts, Ellis's
dogcart was the brightest green of them all) Ada had another lemonade,
and Ellis had something else. They saw the Park, and Ada giggled
charmingly her appreciation of its beauty. The conversation throughout
consisted chiefly of Ada's teeth. Ellis said he would return by a
different route, and he managed to get lost. How anyone driving to
Hanbridge from Sneyd could arrive at the mining village of Silverton is
a mystery. But Ellis arrived there, and he ultimately came out at
Hillport, the aristocratic suburb of Bursley, where he had always lived
till the last year. He feared recognition there, and his fear was
justified. Some silly ass, a schoolmate, cried, 'Go it!' as the machine
bowled along, and the mischief was that the mare, startled, went it. She
went it down the curving hill, and the vehicle after her, like a kettle
tied to a dog's tail.

Ellis winked stoutly at Ada when they reached the bottom, and gave the
mare a piece of his mind, to which she objected. As they crossed the
railway-bridge a goods-train ran underneath and puffed smoke into the
mare's eyes. She set her ears back.

'Would you!' cried Ellis authoritatively, and touched her with the whip
(he had forgotten the handbook).

He scarce