"Here," said Mifflin, handing me the reins, "you're skipper,
you'd better drive.  Which way do you want to go?"

My breath came a little fast when I realized that my adventure
had begun!

                        CHAPTER FOUR

Just out of sight of the farm the road forks, one way running
on to Walton where you cross the river by a covered bridge,
the other swinging down toward Greenbriar and Port Vigor.
Mrs. Collins lives a mile or so up the Walton road, and as I
very often run over to see her I thought Andrew would be most
likely to look for me there.  So, after we had passed through
the grove, I took the right-hand turn to Greenbriar.  We began
the long ascent over Huckleberry Hill and as I smelt the fresh
autumn odour of the leaves I chuckled a little.

Mr. Mifflin seemed in a perfect ecstasy of high spirits.
"This is certainly grand," he said.  "Lord, I applaud your
spunk.  Do you think Mr. McGill will give chase?"

"I haven't an idea," I said.  "Not right away, anyhow.  He's
so used to my settled ways that I don't think he'll suspect
anything till he finds my note.  I wonder what kind of story
Mrs. McNally will tell!"

"How about putting him off the scent?" he said.  "Give me your
handkerchief."

I did so.  He hopped nimbly out, ran back down the hill (he
was a spry little person in spite of his bald crown), and
dropped the handkerchief on the Walton Road about a hundred
feet beyond the fork.  Then he followed me up the slope.

"There," he said, grinning like a kid, "that'll fool him.  The
Sage of Redfield will undoubtedly follow a false spoor and the
criminals will win a good start.  But I'm afraid it's rather
easy to follow a craft as unusual as Parnassus."

"Tell me how you manage the thing," I said.  "Do you really
make it pay?"  We halted at the top of the hill to give
Pegasus a breathing space.  The terrier lay down in the dust
and watched us gravely.  Mr. Mifflin pulled out a pipe and
begged my permission to smoke.

"It's rather comical how I first got into it," he said.  "I
was a school teacher down in Maryland.  I'd been plugging away
in a country school for years, on a starvation salary.  I was
trying to support an invalid mother, and put by something in
case of storms.  I remember how I used to wonder whether I'd
ever be able to wear a suit that wasn't shabby and have my
shoes polished every day.  Then my health went back on me.
The doctor told me to get into the open air.  By and by I got
this idea of a travelling bookstore.  I had always been a
lover of books, and in the days when I boarded out among the
farmers I used to read aloud to them.  After my mother died I
built the wagon to suit my own ideas, bought a stock of books
from a big second-hand store in Baltimore, and set out.
Parnassus just about saved my life I guess."

He pushed his faded old cap back on his head and relit his
pipe.  I clicked to Pegasus and we rumbled gently off over the
upland, looking down across the pastures.  Distant cow bells
sounded tankle-tonk among the bushes.  Across the slope of the
hill I could see the road winding away to Redfield.  Somewhere
along that road Andrew would be rolling back toward home and
roast pork with apple sauce; and here was I, setting out on
the first madness of my life without even a qualm.

"Miss McGill," said the little man, "this rolling pavilion has
been wife, doctor, and religion to me for seven years.  A
month ago I would have scoffed at the thought of leaving her;
but somehow it's come over me I need a change.  There's a book
I've been yearning to write for a long time, and I need a desk
steady under my elbows and a roof over my head.  And silly as
it seems, I'm crazy to get back to Brooklyn.  My brother and
I used to live there as kids.  Think of walking over the old
Bridge at sunset and seeing the towers of Manhattan against a
red sky!  And those old gray cruisers down in the Navy Yard!
You don't know how tickled I am to sell out.  I've sold a lot
of copies of your brother's books and I've often thought he'd
be the man to buy Parnassus if I got tired of her."

"So he would," I said.  "Just the man.  He'd be only too
likely to--and go maundering about in this jaunting car and
neglect the farm.  But tell me about selling books.  How much
profit do you make out of it?  We'll be passing Mrs. Mason's
farm, by and by, and we might as well sell her something just
to make a start."

"It's very simple," he said.  "I replenish my stock whenever
I go through a big town.  There's always a second-hand
bookstore somewhere about, where you can pick up odds and
ends.  And every now and then I write to a wholesaler in New
York for some stuff.  When I buy a book I mark in the back
just what I paid for it, then I know what I can afford to sell
it for.  See here."

He pulled up a book from behind the seat--a copy of "Lorna