“Is Uncle Ben coming?  Have I got to ride Greased Lightning?  Di, are you there? are you close to me?”

“Course I is,” answered Diana.  “Orion, don’t you be such a silly; I is with you.  There’s nothing going to happen.”

“Nothing?  Are you certain sure?” asked the child.

“K’ite.  I is with you, Orion; don’t you be fwightened; there’s nothing going to happen.”

Orion leaned comfortably back against the fat little shoulder.

“P’w’aps you is a bit hung’y,” said Diana.  “There’s bwead and milk on the table; Aunt Sawah left it.  Shall we eat our supper afore we talks?”

“I can’t eat,” replied Orion.  “I’m not a scrap hungry; I am never hungry now.  I wonder you can eat, Diana.”

“Course I can eat,” replied Diana; “I aren’t a silly.  I has got to wide G’eased Lightning.  I love G’eased Lightning.  Don’t know why you is fwightened of him.”

“But I am to ride Pole Star, and he’s worse than Greased Lightning,” replied Orion.

“Well, you listen to me,” said Diana, speaking in a very firm and authoritative voice.  “See, I am eating up my supper, and you had best have some with me.  I’ll sit by you on the floor, if you like, and feed you same as if you was a baby.”

“But you are younger nor me,” said Orion, with a little laugh; “seems, though, as if you were much older.”

“Can’t help that,” answered Diana; “can’t help feelin’ old, whether we is nor not.  You is almost a baby—­I is k’ite a big girl.  Now, open your mouth; I am going to pop in some food.  Here’s a vedy nice piece of bwead.”

Orion did what Diana wished, but he could scarcely eat.  Tears came suddenly into his eyes.

“I wish I was dead, like poor Rub-a-Dub,” he said, after a pause; “I wish I was lying in the beautiful garden, in the cemetery part with Rub-a-Dub.”

“Oh, don’t be such a silly!” said Diana.  “You has a lot to do afore you is deaded.  Don’t forget that you is a star and a giant.”

“No, that I aren’t,” said the child.  “Oh, Di! if mother was here she would be disappointed, for I am not a star, nor yet a giant.  I’m just the frightenest little boy in the world.”

“I has thought of a plan,” said Diana very calmly.  “You shan’t wide Pole Star to-morrow; you shall wide G’eased Lightning.”

“But I am nearly as frightened of one horse as the other.”

“I know G’eased Lightning k’ite well by this time,” continued Diana, “and if I are there he’ll be gentle.  You shall wide him, and I’ll wide Pole Star.”

“But I heard Uncle Ben say that I was to have the other horse.”

“Never you mind that.  What does that si’nify?  I’ll manage.  I’m not fwightened of any horse that ever walked.  If I are there, and if I look at G’eased Lightning, he’ll be as good as good can be, and you must just keep looking at me, Orion, and do the things that I do.  When you see me standing on Pole Star you must stand on your two foots on G’eased Lightning, and when we fly faster and faster you must still keep looking at me, and when I jump through the wings you must do the same, and then, Orion, then, why, it will be over.  Now, bend down; I’m going to whisper something to you.”