“Safe,” answered Dorothy.  “A strange man stopped the runaway.  Tavia is helping hold the horse.  We must get the traces loose before we can attend to Nita.”

She made her way out of the overturned wagon.  The traces were unfastened and the horse was free, and the strange man was actually astride the animal.

“Why,” exclaimed Dorothy, “that horse will bolt again.  You had best make him fast somewhere!”

The stranger looked at her with the air of a Chesterfield.

“By kindness we alone subdue,” he said.

Dorothy stared at him.  What could he mean?

Tavia seemed to have forgotten the predicament of her companions—­she appeared charmed by the stranger—­who really was good looking.

“There comes the man who owns the horse,” remarked Dorothy, as the frenzied farmer, whip in hand, ran toward the stranger, yelling all sorts of unintelligible things in the way of threats and predictions.  He would see to it personally, he declared, that these things would happen to the man who dared ride his used-up horse.

“A fight to finish it off,” exulted Tavia, and Dorothy, for the moment, felt as if she could find it in her heart to despise so frivolous a girl.  The next second she remembered Nita, and turned back to the wrecked hayrick.

“It’s all well enough for you to laugh,” complained the badly-frightened Nita, “but I can’t see where the joke comes in.  Just look at me!”

“A perfect beauty!” declared Tavia.  “The rips are all in one piece.  That rent near the hem is positively artistic—­looks like the river Nile!”

It was some time later, but they were still in the roadway.  The farmer had patched up his damaged rig, but would not listen to the girls’ appeals to give them a lift toward town.  He insisted it was all their fault for laughing and scaring the horses, and he vowed vengeance on the man who really had saved the team from positive destruction in the river.

The strange young man, after considerable gusto, all of which was wasted on the farmer, but hugely enjoyed by Tavia at least, had made his way off, leaving the girls discreetly to their woes.  No one was actually injured, although, as Nita said, costumes had suffered severely.

“Wasn’t he queer?” remarked Cologne, as she shook small bundles of hay from her Glenwood cap and blouse.  “I thought I would laugh outright when he mounted the old horse a second time.  He looked like somebody on a variety stage.”

“Yes,” added Tavia, “and Dorothy had to spoil the show by inducing him to give up the act.  What if the farmer did ply the whip?  That would only heighten the effect.”

“Since we have to walk,” Nita reminded the others, “it might be advisable to start.”

“Great head,” commented Tavia, “but do you realize that we shall be locked out?  That the ogresses of ‘Glen’ will be ready—­axe in hand, block in evidence, grin prominent——­”