There was nobody to say them nay, so in a few minutes they were trotting briskly along the Glenbury Road. Diana was a capital little Jehu, and held the reins with a practised hand. Baron, perfectly conscious of who was driving him, behaved admirably. The girls felt their spirits at high-water mark. They had certainly scored over the rest of the school, and secured a superior jaunt to anybody. Moreover, it was a pleasant afternoon to be out. The weather, which for some days had been damp, had changed to windy. Long, dappled mare's-tail clouds stretched across the pale November sky, and every now and then the sun shone out between them. The glory of the autumn tints had been blown away, but the infinitely intertwined, almost leafless boughs of the woodlands had a beauty apart from foliage. Bushes covered with crimson masses of hips or haws foretold a hard winter; birds twittered restlessly in the hedgerows; and the withered leaves came whirling along the road with a scurrying, rustling sound as of the little footsteps of innumerable fairies. A seed-vessel of the sycamore, flying like a miniature aeroplane, struck Diana full in the face. She picked it up as it fell on her coat, and put it in her pocket.