“‘Loveland,’ yells Jonadab, out of the port corner of his mouth, ’if I ain’t showin’ you my tailboard by the time we pass the fust house in Denboro, I’ll eat my Sunday hat.’

“I cal’late he would ‘a’ beat, too.  We was drawin’ ahead all the time and had a three-quarter length lead when we swung clear of the woods and sighted Denboro village, quarter of a mile away.  And up the road comes flyin’ a big auto, goin’ to beat the cars.

“Let’s forget the next few minutes; they wa’n’t pleasant ones for me.  Soon’s the Bay Queen sot eyes on that auto, she stopped trottin’ and commenced to hop; from hoppin’ she changed to waltzin’ and high jumpin’.  When the smoke had cleared, the auto was out of sight and we was in the bushes alongside the road, with the Queen just gettin’ ready to climb a tree.  As for Tobias and Henrietta, they was roundin’ the turn by the fust house in Denboro, wavin’ by-bys to us over the back of the seat.

“We went home then; and every foot of the way Cap’n Jonadab called an automobile a new kind of name, and none complimentary.  The boarders, they got wind of what had happened and begun to rag him, and the more they ragged, the madder he got and the more down on autos.

“And, to put a head on the whole business, I’m blessed if Tobias Loveland didn’t get in with an automobile agent who was stoppin’ in Orham and buy a fifteen-hundred-dollar machine off him.  And the very next time Jonadab was out with the Queen on the Denboro road, Tobias and the widow whizzed past him in that car so fast he might as well have been hove to.  And, by way of rubbin’ it in, they come along back pretty soon and rolled alongside of him easy, while Henrietta gushed about Mr. Loveland’s beautiful car and how nice it was to be able to go just as swift as you wanted to.  Jonadab couldn’t answer back, nuther, bein’ too busy keepin’ the Queen from turnin’ herself into a flyin’ machine.

“’Twas then that he got himself swore in special constable to arrest auto drivers for overspeedin’; and for days he wandered round layin’ for a chance to haul up Tobias and get him fined.  He’d have had plenty of game if he’d been satisfied with strangers, but he didn’t want them anyhow, and, besides, most of ’em was on their way to spend money at the Old Home House.  ’Twould have been poor business to let any of that cash go for fines, and he realized it.

“’Twas in early June, only a few weeks ago, that the widow come to our hotel.  I never thought she meant it when she said she was comin’, and so I didn’t expect her.  Fact is, I was expectin’ to hear that she and Tobe Loveland was married or engaged.  But there was a slip up somewheres, for all to once the depot wagon brings her to the Old Home House, she hires a room, and settles down to stay till the season closed, which would be in about a fortn’t.

“From the very fust she played her cards for Jonadab.  He meant to be middlin’ average frosty to her, I imagine—­her bein’ so thick with Tobias prejudiced him, I presume likely.  But land sakes! she thawed him out like hot toddy thaws out some folks’ tongues.  She never took no notice of his coldness, but smiled and gushed and flattered, and looked her prettiest—­which was more’n average, considerin’ her age—­and by the end of the third day he was hangin’ round her like a cat round a cook.