“There is everything to be mad about. How did you know he wanted me to get a horse? Only because I told you. And then you go to him and interfere with my business and insinuate I’m incapable.” “It’s not so much you’re incapable——” he began. “It’s because a woman’s place isn’t the cattle-market, I know. But why can’t we buy cows as well as butter, and horses as well as horse-collars?” “Because only men go—and it’s rough.” “Well then, let women go and it won’t be.” “And do you want women to be horsemen too, get up at four o’clock and go ploughing?” “Why not?” “They haven’t the strength, for one thing. There’s lots of things they can’t do, and never will. Take thatching, for instance—you can’t imagine a woman sprawling along a roof.” “Yes, I can.” “Of course _you_ can,” he sneered. “You can imagine her in breeches.” “If petticoats get in the way.” “There’ll never be Bloomerites in England,” he said grimly. “You mark my word. If a woman can’t plough or dig without leggings, that’s a proof she wasn’t meant to plough or dig.” They had reached now the pleached and tangly path back to the road, but she darted ahead of him, battling with the branches herself in her revolt from dependence. He could not regain the lead unless he jostled rudely, and every now and then—not with wilful malice, but no less maddeningly—she held back for him the boughs she had parted. And all the while the sleeping Nip was protected too: clasped by one hand to her bosom. Suddenly the circle of her little horn got caught in the bushes like the horn of Isaac’s ram. “Why, Jinny,” he cried, “we forgot all about the horn! Wait! Wait!” She disentangled it calmly. “You shan’t blow mine. You must blow your own now.” He fired up. “You want to get out of the gloves.” “Now you’re going horn-mad,” she jested icily, emerging on the high road. “Good-bye, Mr. Flynt.” It was the first time she had withheld the Will. “Good-bye, Miss Boldero,” he said as frigidly, removing his hat with an exaggerated gallantry. Each felt that the parting was final: never would they even speak to each other again. But they had yet to reckon with Nip. For that intelligent creature, waking into the distressing atmosphere that had been generated while his vigilance was relaxed, would be no party to the breach. When he perceived that the cart was to go off without Will, he jumped down and tried to chevy him into it, and as the parties went off at a tangent, he ran desperately from one to the other, striving to shepherd them together, barking and pleading and panting like a toy engine. It was only a peremptory blast from a distant horn that at last persuaded the distracted animal where his first duty lay.