don't know any sweeter music than an engine that has suddenly made up its mind to reform, and take you home. You are a horse person, I know, and this doesn't appeal to you. Well, suppose every now and then your horse fell dead, and it was up to you to revive it! Wouldn't it be a blessed moment when the corpse would stagger to its feet and neigh? Laugh, if you like, but I guess you'd call it music, too, wouldn't you?
Papa was so grateful to Mr. Marsden that he hardly knew how to say it. He wrung his hand again and again and overflowed; and anybody looking on would have thought he had just saved all our lives—Mr. Marsden, I mean. And so he had, of course, and more, too; for papa was morbidly conscious of his armor and pirate boots, and knew what a figure he had cut before a whole dragful of people home from the ball. Mr. Marsden had rescued him from a horrible mortification, because no one could have helped laughing, you know—what with his having a big lick
89
