"I didn't know you intended leaving," he said. "Where are you going?"
Florence regarded her companion from the corner of her eye.
"I'm going away for good," she said.
Ben shifted half around in the saddle and folded back the rim of his big sombrero.
"For good, you say?"
The girl's brown eyes were cast down demurely. "Yes, for good," she repeated.
They had been losing ground. Now in silence they galloped ahead, the regular muffled patter of their horses' feet upon the frozen sod sounding like the distant rattle of a snare-drum. Once again even with the buckboard, they lapsed into a walk.
"You haven't told me where you're going," repeated Blair.
The question seemed to be of purest politeness, as a host inquires if his visitor has rested well; yet for a dozen years they two had lived nearest neighbors, and had grown to maturity side by side. She concluded there were some phases of this silent youth which she had not yet learned.
"We haven't decided where we're going yet," she replied. "Mamma wants to go to England, but papa and I refuse to leave this country. Then daddy wants to live in a small town, and I vote for a big one. Just now we're at deadlock."
A smile started in Ben's blue eyes and spread over his thin face.
"From the way you talk," he said, "I have a suspicion the deadlock won't last long. If I stretch my imagination a little I can guess pretty close to the decision."
Florence was sober a moment; then a smile flashed over her face and left the daintiest of dimples in either cheek.
"Maybe you can," she said.
For the second time they galloped ahead and caught up with the slower buckboard.
"Florence," Ben threw one leg over the pommel of his saddle and faced his companion squarely, "I've heard your mother talk, and of course I understand why she wants to go back among her folks, but you were raised here. Why do you want to leave?"
The girl hesitated, and ran her fingers through her horse's mane.
"Mamma's been here against her will for a good many years. We ought to go for her sake."
Ben made a motion of deprecation. "What I want to know is the real reason,--your own reason," he said.
The warm blood flushed Florence's face. "By what right do you ask that?" she retorted. "You seem to forget that we've both grown up since we went to school together."
Ben looked calmly out over the prairie.
"No, I don't forget; and I admit I have no right to ask. But I may ask as a friend, I am sure. Why do you want to go?"