When he went into her room, he found her lighting the fire and his father just getting up. So he took up the baby who was awake too and cared for him till his mother had the breakfast ready. She was looking gloomy and his father too was silent. Diamond felt that in a few minutes, he would be just as miserable. But he tried with all his might to be jolly with the baby and presently his mother just had to smile. "Why, Diamond, child!" she said at last. "You are as good to your mother as if you were a girl--nursing the baby and toasting the bread, and sweeping up the hearth. I declare a body would think you had been among the fairies." "I've been at the back of the north wind," said Diamond to himself happily. And now his father was more cheerful too. "Won't you come out and see the cab, Diamond?" he asked. "Yes, father, in just a minute after I put the baby down." So his father went on ahead. When Diamond got out into the yard, the horse was between the shafts. Diamond went around to look at him. The sight of him made him feel very queer. He could not make it out. What horse was it that looked so familiar? When he came around in front and the old horse put out his long neck and began rubbing against him, Diamond saw it could be no other than old Diamond and he just put his arms around his neck and cried. "Isn't it jolly, father!" he said. "Was there ever anybody so lucky as we! Dear old Diamond!" He hugged the horse again and kissed both his big, hairy cheeks. He could only manage one at a time, however--the other cheek was so far off on the other side of old Diamond's big head. And now his father took up the reins to drive off. "Oh, father, do let me drive a bit!" cried Diamond jumping up on the box beside him. His father put the reins into his hands and began to show him how to drive. He let Diamond drive quite a little way and then the boy jumped down and ran gaily back to his mother. Now it happened that the man who sold old Diamond back to his father, saw how delighted little Diamond was to learn to drive. And that evening, shortly before Diamond's father came home, the man asked Diamond's mother if the boy might not go a little way with him. "He cannot go far," said his mother, "for he is not very strong yet." "I will take him only as far as the square," said the man. Diamond's mother said he might go as far as that. Dancing with delight, Diamond ran to get his cap and in a few minutes was jumping into the cab. The man gave him the reins and showed him how to drive safely through the gate and Diamond got along famously. Just as they were turning into the square, they had an adventure. It was getting quite dusky. A cab was coming rapidly from the other direction, and Diamond pulling aside and the other driver pulling up, they just escaped a collision. And there was his father! "Why, Diamond, it is a bad beginning to run into your own father," he said.