"I'm not so sure," she said. "It would be just like him to try to get even with us by blocking the road." "Get even with us?" repeated Betty indignantly. "I might just as well say I want to get even with him for being in the road when I wanted to pass. How ridiculous." "Of course it's ridiculous. That's probably the reason he would think of it," insisted Mollie. "I know these farmers," she added, nodding darkly. They laughed at her, and Betty cried gayly: "Well, we won't get anywhere by standing here in the road. I move we follow the old fellow and see what he's up to. And if he gets too ridiculous," she added, as she climbed back into the car, "I know how I'll fix him." "How?" they asked. "I'll bump him," she responded ferociously, and amid more fun and laughter they climbed back into the cars and started on again. "You know, even his back looks stubborn," remarked Grace, when, coming close to the wagon and tooting the horn vigorously, the driver refused to budge from the middle of the road. "I guess perhaps you will have to carry out your threat, Betty." "Well, I declare if I won't," exclaimed the Little Captain, her cheeks flushing and her eyes blazing at the stubborn insolence of the man. "It would give me great pleasure to bump him clear down the side of the mountain." "It's getting late, too," worried Grace. "Can't you do something, Betty?" "Will you please suggest something?" cried Betty, exasperated. "There's nothing in the rules for driving a machine that covers this difficulty. I don't know what to do, unless-- Did you bring the pistol?" Grace started. "Goodness! you're not going to kill him are you?" "Not unless I have to," replied Betty, and at her expression, Grace laughed weakly. "Yes, I brought the pistol," she said. "But it's down in the bottom of the bag that is underneath all the other bags in the tonneau of Mollie's car." Betty groaned. "And it isn't even loaded," added Grace, as an afterthought. "Mother said it made her feel safer to have it along since there aren't going to be any men with us, but she wouldn't have it loaded." "What good is it then?" queried Betty. "Just to scare people with." "Well, that's what I want to do to that--man," cried Betty, trying to think of something bad enough to call the cranky farmer, who still urged his team along squarely in the middle of the road and refused to give an inch. "Only I'd like to scare him to death. My conscience wouldn't even hurt." "It would be murder just the same," Grace suggested, with a little hysterical laugh, "whether you shot him or scared him to death." Betty was silent for a minute or two, crawling along behind the wagon while her blood boiled and her anger surged. For Betty came from a race of fighting ancestors who were not in the habit of submitting to indignities.