Annie rose too, but with no great alacrity: in fact, she remarked that she was sick of the hobby-horses. I pretended not to believe her. We went back to the spot where she had first spoken to me, and, when the machine came to a standstill, secured two riderless steeds. Mine was on the outside and Annie’s of course next to it, but we were no sooner in possession of them than I became aware of Katherine and Gerald among the spectators quite close to us. I looked the other way, and I felt my face grow crimson. It seemed to me that the engine-man would never set us in motion. Already we appeared to have been waiting for an eternity. Annie was laughing and chattering, and I answered at random, though, indeed, to the kind of remarks she was making, any sort of answer served. Had she, too, seen the Dales? for her vivacity had suddenly become much more noisy and familiar, with something about it that smacked rather of town than of country? I noticed that all the other riders were obviously in couples, and that most of the youths were supporting their partners in a strikingly gallant fashion. Annie had already given me permission to follow their example by telling me half a dozen times she was sure she’d fall off. I didn’t care very much whether she did or not. At last, with a shrill and frivolous scream, the huge construction began to revolve slowly, and our horses to move up and down on their polished brass rods. We swept by within a yard or two of Katherine and Gerald, but I looked straight before me, my face burning. I would have liked to pretend that I was there for a solitary ride, quite independent of Annie, but her manner made any such hypocrisy perfectly futile. Round we came a second time, and a third, gathering velocity at every moment. Annie had taken off her hat and put it on my horse’s head, and her skirts streamed out behind, and flapped against my right leg. “Peter!”