`` I hope you 'll get safe to Bothwell . If I was ten years younger I vow I 'd pack a grip and go along with you . I like your spunk . Most of the girls nowadays is such timid , skeery critters . When I was a girl I was n't afraid of nothing or nobody . '' We said and did nothing until we had driven out of sight and earshot . Then Kate laid down the reins and laughed until the tears came . `` Oh , Phil , Phil , will you ever forget this adventure ? '' she gasped . `` I shall never forget Mrs. Matilda Pitman , '' I said emphatically . We had no further adventures that day . Robert Chapman had fixed the tongue so well -- probably under Mrs. Matilda Pitman 's watchful eyes -- that we could drive as fast as we liked ; and we made good progress . But when we pitched camp that night Kate scanned the sky with an anxious expression . `` I do n't like the look of it , '' she said . `` I 'm afraid we 're going to have a bad day tomorrow . '' * * * * * We had . When we awakened in the morning rain was pouring down . This in itself might not have prevented us from travelling , but the state of the trail did . It had been raining the greater part of the night and the trail was little more than a ditch of slimy , greasy , sticky mud . If we could have stayed in the tent the whole time it would not have been quite so bad .
But we had XXXXX go out twice to take the ponies to the nearest pond and water them ; moreover , we had to collect pea vines for them , which was not an agreeable occupation in a pouring rain .
If as from of than that to under until with